Residents reported seeing Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) officers from Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Hyattsville early during the Wednesday morning commute.
Between 8am and 9am, local photographer Raphi Talisman took a video of an ICE arrest in the middle of Hamilton St at its intersection with Queens Chapel and posted it to social media.
In the video, a man repeatedly yells, “Help me!” in English and Spanish. In English he yells, “I am American,” “I born D.C,” “I live in America, I love you America,” and “police!” as he is pinned to the ground. At one point, an agent’s gun falls to the ground, the man stretches towards it in the struggle, and the agent scrambles to pick it up, briefly aiming the gun at commuters and onlookers as he stands.
“What—are you going to kill me?” one bystander yells, while another calls, “Put the gun down!”
At least six ERO officers are involved in the attempt to shackle the man that takes nearly 10 minutes. One of the officers continues to stand facing stopped cars and interacting with onlookers, his gun drawn.
Bystanders yell throughout, “leave him alone” and “we don’t want you here.” They ask the man being arrested his name, and he gives the name Job Mendoza.
One officer wears a balaclava. When bystanders yell at him to remove his mask, he yells, “you want to be next?”
Onlookers ask why the agents are arresting the man, and the officer whose gun is drawn says, “because he’s a criminal.”
Three of the officers involved in this arrest were seen earlier the same morning on 43rd Ave in front of Garfield Court apartments, making a traffic stop in an unmarked car.
According to City Councilmember Edouard Haba (Ward 4), there has been an increase in ICE activities in our area, especially in the Queen Chapel Rd and Hamilton St area, over the past few weeks.
Residents have also reported seeing ICE officers at Home Depot in recent weeks.
The Hyattsville Life & Times reached out to ICE to ask for information about the Sept. 24 arrest, and did not receive an immediate reply.
The Life & Times has not received any reports of the Hyattsville Police Department working with ICE officers. On Sept. 26, an HPD spokesperson wrote in an email that the department “did not know the identification” of the man being detained in the video, and could not comment on a federal law enforcement matter.