Woman wrongfully detained in immigration raid describes what she endured
PBS News Hour - Segments
PBS NewsHour
4.1 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 17 September 2025
⏱️ 8 minutes
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| 0:00.0 | to the Trump administration's aggressive approach to immigration enforcement and the case of a U.S. |
| 0:05.7 | citizen who was caught in the middle. Andrea Veles says she was wrongfully arrested this past summer |
| 0:11.1 | in downtown Los Angeles, swept up in an immigration raid on her way to work. Feles says she froze, |
| 0:17.6 | was knocked to the ground by an ICE officer, and despite declaring her citizenship |
| 0:21.6 | was detained and led to a car. Fearing she was being kidnapped, she ran toward nearby LAPD officers |
| 0:28.3 | when ICE agents caught her and carried her back. She spent two nights in jail before facing a felony |
| 0:34.2 | charge for obstructing an officer. A charge, the Justice Department dropped two |
| 0:38.8 | weeks later. I spoke earlier with Andrea Veles and her attorney, Luis Carrillo. Thank you both for |
| 0:45.9 | being with this. Andrea, we'll start with you. Take us back to that morning. Your mother and sister had |
| 0:50.3 | just dropped you off for work. What happened next? Suddenly, I saw these cars swarving in, |
| 0:55.0 | and I just remembered that they got out their cars at abruptly, |
| 0:58.0 | and then they just looked like they were just ready to attack and chase. |
| 1:03.0 | They never identified themselves as ICE agents. |
| 1:07.0 | They just started chasing people, and I remember watching just people running and one of them |
| 1:13.4 | I think was a street vendor and that's when I noticed one coming towards my direction and I used |
| 1:20.4 | my bag as a form of protection to shield myself then I remember that he just got and pushed me and slammed me to the to the floor, to the ground. |
| 1:33.3 | He started proceeding to say that I was interfering and that he was going to arrest me. |
| 1:38.3 | I asked him for his batch number and his identification and also if he had a warrant and he said that I didn't |
| 1:48.4 | need to know any of that because all I had to look was at his vests. They were all wearing civilian |
| 1:55.6 | clothing sneakers and gator masks. And when he was trying to arrest me, |
| 2:02.8 | I noticed that there was people filming. |
| 2:05.5 | And I started saying my name. |
... |
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