Two Minneapolis U.S. citizens who were monitoring Immigration and Customs Enforcement activities said they were detained without charge Sunday, held for several hours at a federal facility on the edge of the city, and pressed by a Department of Homeland Security investigator to identify protest organizers and neighbors living in the country without legal status, the Associated Press reported. Brandon Sigüenza and Patty O’Keefe said agents pepper-sprayed their car and smashed its windows before transporting them separately to the facility; both were released without charges that evening, then subjected to chemical agents again as they exited.

Their accounts add to a pattern of immigration enforcement conduct described in other cities during the Trump administration’s operations and raise questions about the treatment of U.S. citizens who observe federal enforcement activities and their First Amendment rights to do so.

Detention encounter

Sigüenza and O’Keefe told the AP they were following ICE officers who were driving through Minneapolis making arrests when agents stopped in front of O’Keefe’s car. The officers fired pepper spray through the windshield vent and smashed the car’s windows, they said, even though the doors were unlocked.

“It was very clear that they were trying to just humiliate me, break me down,” O’Keefe said.

The two were placed in separate unmarked SUVs and transported to a highly restricted federal facility on the edge of Minneapolis that the AP described as the operational hub for the enforcement campaign in the Twin Cities. They were held in adjacent cells — one for men, one for women — each no larger than 10 feet by 10 feet, equipped with a concrete bench, a flat-screen TV, a two-way mirror, and a surveillance camera, they said.

On their way to the cells, Sigüenza and O’Keefe said they observed other detainees screaming and crying for help while most stared at the ground. They said they also saw a woman attempting to use a toilet while three male agents watched. The overwhelming majority of detainees were Hispanic men, they said, along with some East African detainees — Minnesota is home to the country’s largest Somali community.

“Just hearing the visceral pain of the people in this center was awful,” O’Keefe said. “And then you juxtapose that with the laughter we heard from the actual agents. … It was very surreal and kind of shocking.”

Sigüenza said one of his cellmates had a cut on his head and another had an injured toe, but neither was offered medical assistance. He said requests for water or to use the bathroom outside their cells were ignored.

Offer of money for names

Sigüenza, who is Hispanic, said a DHS investigator took him to a separate room and offered him money or legal protection for family members in exchange for the names of protest organizers or neighbors without legal immigration status.

“At one point, the officer said in vague terms that it looks like I’m in trouble, and he could possibly help me out,” Sigüenza said. He said he refused the offer, adding that he has no family members without legal status.

O’Keefe said agents mocked her appearance and laughed at her during the encounter. They also brought up the killing of Renee Good — a 37-year-old mother of three who was shot in the head by an ICE officer the previous week in front of her wife. O’Keefe said one agent told her that “obstructing” their work was how Good got killed.

Release and subsequent exposure

Sigüenza and O’Keefe were released without charges by evening. Both said they were subjected to chemical agents officers were using on nearby protesters as they left the facility.

“We were not charged with a crime,” Sigüenza said. “We were released and then tear-gassed on our way out.”

Only Sigüenza was permitted to make a phone call while in custody, which he used to contact his wife, according to the AP. Both were able to speak with lawyers.

DHS, which oversees ICE and the Border Patrol, did not immediately respond to the AP’s request for comment. The department has previously defended conditions at its facilities, saying detainees are fed and their medical concerns are addressed.

An American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit alleges immigration officers have been surveilling activists who monitor their activities in the Twin Cities in alleged violation of First Amendment rights, according to the AP.

Lynn Damiano Pearson, an immigration attorney with the National Immigration Law Center, told the AP that detainees in immigration custody retain basic rights in both immigration and criminal contexts, including access to counsel and a phone, food and water, and privacy from the opposite gender when using the restroom.

Complaints about detention conditions have emerged from other cities where the administration has concentrated enforcement operations. A lawsuit over a facility that served as the Chicago-area operational hub resulted in a judge’s oversight visit and a court order to improve conditions, according to the AP. Similar operations have taken place in Los Angeles, New Orleans, and other cities.