US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained a five-year-old boy in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, on Tuesday as he returned home from school, according to school officials. Liam Ramos, a preschooler, and his father were taken into custody in their driveway and transported to a detention centre in Texas.
The superintendent of Columbia Heights Public Schools, Zena Stenvik, said she drove to the home after learning of the detentions. She described how an agent removed Liam from the car, led him to the front door, and instructed him to knock to see if anyone else was home. Stenvik called this “essentially using a five-year-old as bait”.
Liam’s older brother, a middle schooler, returned home 20 minutes later to find his father and brother missing. Another adult living in the home pleaded to take care of Liam but was denied. Two school principals also arrived to offer support.
Marc Prokosch, the family’s attorney, said the family had an active asylum case and had entered the US at a port of entry. “They did not come here illegally. They are not criminals,” he said, adding that there was no deportation order against them.
The Department of Homeland Security said ICE was conducting a “targeted operation” to arrest Liam’s father, whom it called an “illegal alien”. A spokesperson alleged the father fled on foot, abandoning his child, and that an officer remained with the boy for his safety. The school district reported three other child detentions in the past two weeks, including a 17-year-old taken from a car and a 10-year-old taken on her way to school.
