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Tag: ice official

  • Attorneys for man killed by off-duty ICE agent call on California A.G. to investigate

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    Attorneys for a Los Angeles man shot and killed by an off-duty federal agent on New Year’s Eve are asking the California Attorney General to take over the case, alleging recent comments by LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell show a bias toward the Trump administration.

    In a Tuesday afternoon news conference, attorneys Ben Crump and Jamal Tooson called on Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta to investigate the fatal shooting of Keith Porter at his San Fernando Valley apartment building.

    The request, they said, was based in large part on their lack of confidence in the LAPD and the U.S. Justice Department.

    A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security initially said an off-duty Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who lived at same apartment complex was responding to a suspected “active shooter” when he opened fire. Porter’s relatives have said they believe he had been firing a gun into the air to ring in the new year.

    Tooson said witnesses have come forward saying that Porter, 43, appeared to be walking back to his apartment when he was shot, and was not a threat to anyone. Tooson also pointed out that witnesses didn’t hear the federal officer identifying himself before firing three shots.

    “So, forgive us, if we have skepticism of any claims of self defense,”according to Tooson, who is representing Porter’s mother, Franceola Armstrong.

    Crump — who previously represented the families of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown, among other high-profile civil rights cases — said he is supporting Porter’s family but not acting as their legal counsel.

    “The family has not been confident that LAPD, with their close relationships with the ICE officials, that there’s going to be a fair and transparent investigation,.” Crump said. “Because them trying to whitewash the investigation into the death of Keith Porter is a nonstarter. We’re not going to allow that to happen.”

    A Los Angeles police spokesperson responded to an inquiry about the remarks with a statement Tuesday afternoon that said: “The LAPD’s Robbery Homicide Division-Homicide Special Section, continues its investigation into the death of Keith Porter. At this time, there are no additional details available for public release.”

    The fatal incident occurred at the Village Pointe Apartments on Roscoe Boulevard around 10:30 p.m. on Dec. 31, 2025. Local police have refrained from using the Department of Homeland Security’s characterization of Porter as an “active shooter.” Nobody else was reported injured at the scene.

    Tooson and Porter’s relatives have repeatedly said that even if he was shooting a gun into the air — an activity that can bring felony charges and is discouraged as dangerous by city leaders — he was not threatening anyone and contended the agent who opened fire should have waited for LAPD to respond.

    Stacie Halpern, an attorney for the ICE agent, has said there is evidence that Porter shot first. A law enforcement source, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, echoed those claims to The Times last month.

    Halpern didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment left after Tuesday’s press conference.

    In a statement, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office said it was confident that the LAPD was “conducting a thorough and independent investigation.”

    “Once the case is presented to our office, we will carefully examine the evidence, review the facts, and apply the law to determine whether criminal charges are appropriate,” the statement read. “This is the same rigorous, impartial process we use in every use-of-force case submitted to the District Attorney’s Office.”

    Porter’s death has become a rallying point locally for activists, who regularly invoke his name at Police Commission meetings and protests. Hours before the press conference, numerous speakers showed up to the Commission’s meeting to demand that the federal agent responsible be arrested.

    Last month, The Times identified the officer as Brian Palacios. Palacios lived in an apartment a short distance away from where Porter was killed, and has previously been accused during a custody dispute of child abuse and making racist remarks about Black and Latino men, according to court records reviewed by The Times. Records provided by Halpern show the child abuse allegations were deemed unfounded by police and the L.A. County Department of Child & Family Servies. Halpern also denied her client ever used racist language.

    In a statement issued in late January, a manager for the apartment complex said “the ICE agent is no longer a tenant and has permanently vacated the property.”

    In his call for an outside investigation, Tooson argued McDonnell is too cozy with ICE and other federal agencies to oversee an impartial investigation of Palacios’ conduct.

    Despite months of federal immigration raids causing chaos in and around Los Angeles, the chief has largely avoided criticizing the Trump administration, at times boasting about the strength of LAPD’s ties to federal law enforcement. He said last week he would not enforce a new California law — which is already being challenged in court — that bars ICE agents from wearing masks while on-duty.

    McDonell has stood by LAPD’s policy of not getting involved in civil immigration enforcement. When he served as L.A. County sheriff during President Trump’s first term, McDonnell took criticism for allowing ICE to access the jails when seeking inmates for deportation. His position on immigration was viewed a factor in the 2018 sheriff’s race, which saw McDonnell lose in an upset to Alex Villanueva.

    Addressing reporters on Tuesday, Armstrong, Porter’s mother, said she remained heartbroken by the thought of waking up everyday without her son, who was a Compton native and father of two.

    “I can’t bring my son back, but I want justice for him. I want justice for my child,” she said.

    Times Staff Writer Richard Winton contributed to this report.

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    James Queally, Libor Jany

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  • ICE officials replaced with Border Patrol, cementing hard tactics that originated in California

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    WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is initiating a leadership shakeup at a dozen or so offices of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to bring more aggressive enforcement operations across the U.S.

    Some of the outgoing field office directors at ICE are anticipated to be replaced with leaders from Customs and Border Protection, according to news reports. Among the leaders targeted for replacement are Los Angeles Field Office Director Ernesto Santacruz and San Diego Field Office Director Patrick Divver, the Washington Examiner reported Monday.

    The stepped up role of Border Patrol leaders in interior enforcement — which has historically been ICE territory — marks an evolution of tactics that originated in California.

    In late December, Gregory Bovino, who heads the Border Patrol’s El Centro region, led a three-day raid in rural Kern County, nabbing day laborers more than 300 miles from his typical territory. Former Biden administration officials said Bovino had gone “rogue” and that no agency leaders knew about the operation beforehand.

    Bovino leveraged the spectacle to become the on-the-ground point person for the Trump Administration’s signature issue.

    The three-decade veteran of Border Patrol, who has used slick social media videos to promote the agency’s heavy-handed tactics, brought militarized operations once primarily used at the border into America’s largest cities.

    In Los Angeles this summer, contingents of heavily armed, masked agents began chasing down and arresting day laborers, street vendors and car wash workers. Tensions grew as the administration ordered in the National Guard.

    The efforts seem to have become more aggressive after a Supreme Court order allowed authorities to stop people based on factors such as race or ethnicity, employment and speaking Spanish.

    Bovino moved operations to Chicago and escalated his approach. Immigration agents launched an overnight raid in a crowded apartment, shot gas into crowds of protesters and fatally shot one man.

    Now Bovino is expected to hand-pick some of the replacements at ICE field offices, according to Fox News.

    Tom Wong, who directs the U.S. Immigration Policy Center at UC San Diego, said the leadership changes are unsurprising, given Bovino’s strategies in Los Angeles and Chicago.

    “The Trump administration is blurring the distinction between Border Patrol and ICE,” he said. “The border is no longer just the external boundaries of the United States, but the border is everywhere.”

    Former Homeland Security officials said the large-scale replacement of executives from one agency with those from another agency is unprecedented.

    The two agencies have similar authorities but very different approaches, said Daniel Altman, former head of internal oversight investigations at U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

    ICE officers operate largely inside the country, lean heavily on investigations and typically know when they set out for the day who they are targeting.

    Border Patrol, on the other hand, patrols the borderlands for anyone they encounter and suspect of entering illegally. Amid the rugged terrain and isolation, Border Patrol built a do-it-yourself ethos within the century-old organization, Altman said.

    “Culturally, the Border Patrol prides itself on solving problems, and that means that whatever the current administration needs or wants with respect to immigration enforcement, they’re usually very willing and able to do that,” said Altman.

    White House leadership has not been happy with arrest numbers. Stephen Miller, President Trump’s deputy chief of staff who is heading his immigration initiatives, set a goal of 3,000 immigration arrests per day, which the agency has not been able to meet.

    DHS says it expects to deport 600,000 people by January, a figure that includes people who were turned back at the border or at airports.

    Tricia McLaughlin, assistant public affairs secretary for the Homeland Security department, didn’t confirm or deny the changes but described immigration officials as united.

    “Talk about sensationalism,” she said. “Only the media would describe standard agency personnel changes as a ‘massive shakeup.’ If and when we have specific personnel moves to announce, we’ll do that.”

    White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said, “The President’s entire team is working in lockstep to implement the President’s policy agenda, and the tremendous results from securing the border to deporting criminal illegal aliens speak for themselves.”

    On Fox News on Tuesday, Trump’s border czar Tom Homan said the administration is dedicated to achieving record deportations of primarily immigrants with criminal records.

    “As far as personnel changes, that’s under the purview of the Secretary of Homeland Security,” he said. “I’m at the White House working with people like Stephen Miller, one of the most brilliant people I’ve ever met, to come up with strategic policies and plans — how to get success, how to maintain success, and how to get the numbers ever higher.”

    Deborah Fleischaker, a former ICE and DHS official under the Biden administration, said the personnel moves appear to be an “attempt to migrate a Border Patrol ethos over to ICE.”

    “ICE’s job has historically focused on targeting and enforcing against public safety threats,” she said. “Border Patrol has a much more highly militarized job of securing the border, protecting against transnational crime and drug trafficking and smuggling. That sort of approach doesn’t belong in our cities and is quite dangerous.”

    Fleischaker said it would be difficult to increase deportations, even with Border Patrol leaders at the helm, because of the complexities around securing travel documents and negotiating with countries that are reticent to accept deportees.

    In the meantime, she said, shunting well-liked leaders will sink morale.

    “For the folks who are still there, everybody knows you comply or you risk losing your job,” she said. “Dissent, failure to meet targets or even ask questions aren’t really tolerated.”

    On Tuesday, DHS posted a video montage of Bovino on its Instagram page set to Coldplay’s song “Viva la vida.” The caption read, “WE WILL NOT BE STOPPED.”

    Staff writer Brittny Mejia contributed to this report.

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    Andrea Castillo, Rachel Uranga

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