At least one person was arrested during ICE operations in the Riverhead area Wednesday.
In what appeared to be a targeted action, a man was detained by masked, armed agents in the parking lot outside Suffolk County Criminal Court in Riverside Wednesday morning. He had just left the court building.
Esaul Cordova Garcia was identified by his wife as the man detained by agents. A native of Guatemala, he lives in Flanders with his wife and three children, ages 10, 5 and 2.
According to Suffolk County Court records available online, Cordova Garcia is on probation following his guilty plea in October 2022 to a charge of unlawful surveillance in the second degree, a class E felony, for which he’d been arrested in 2012. He had been released on his own recognizance since his arrest. After his guilty plea in 2022, he was sentenced to five months in jail and five years probation. Court records state his year of birth as 1991.
It is not clear why Cordova Garcia was at the courthouse yesterday, as he was not due in court, but the Suffolk County Probation Department has an office in the Suffolk County criminal court complex in Riverside.
As he approached his parked car Wednesday morning at about 11:25, Cordova Garcia found himself surrounded by several armed men and one woman wearing masks and vests marked “HSI” or “ERO” or “POLICE.” One agent had what appeared to be a blue-colored canister of pepper spray in his right, with the safety pin unplugged and dangling hand They had pulled up to the area where his car was parked, with one of their vehicles stopped directly in front of his. He did not resist and was quickly handcuffed and put into an agent’s vehicle. At least one agent appeared to be searching his car.
The agents’ vehicles, a mix of SUVs and sedans, were unmarked and did not have lights flashing until they were pulling away with their prisoner in custody. All had completely blacked-out windows, other than the windshields. At least one vehicle bore New York license plates with two different numbers.
A group of people alerted to the action by local rapid-response networks gathered at the site, shouting at the agents from a distance of 10 to 15 feet, with one or two people briefly stepping in closer while recording the activity with their phones. “Shame, shame, shame,” they yelled in unison. Others shouted “coward,” calling on them to unmask. Most of the monitors continuously recorded the agents actions with smart phones. Two or three agents responded by yelling at the monitors to get back and “stop impeding” their work. The videos of the action posted on social media do not depict anyone interfering with the agents’ work or blocking their vehicles as they pulled away.
Reports of suspicious vehicles in the Riverhead area began in the early hours of the day Wednesday. According to witnesses, cars similar to those used in other operations were seen in local neighborhoods, in the Walmart parking lot, in the New York State Police parking area, at the Bank of America branch, and finally gathered in the courthouse parking lot.
Anita Boyer of Hampton Bays, one of the leading organizers of rallies against ICE on the East End, said in an interview today she belongs to a couple of rapid response networks whose members attempt to monitor and document ICE activity in the area. She began to receive messages about ICE in the Riverhead area early on Wednesday and drove around the area with her husband, part of a roving patrol in search of possible ICE vehicles.
Source: RiverheadLOCAL
