ICE beating allegation leads to calls for inquiry in Minnesota

Summary

Castañeda Mondragón’s account, described by the Associated Press, portrays a custody encounter in which the narrative of how his injuries happened quickly diverged from the injuries themselves. He told AP that he remembers immigration officers pulling him from a friend’s car outside a St. Paul shopping center, throwing him to the ground and handcuffing him, then punching him and striking his head with a steel baton. He said that after being taken to a detention facility he was beaten again, and that he later experienced emergency-room care after doctors identified multiple life-threatening injuries.

AP reported that Castañeda Mondragón told the outlet that his memory was jumbled, while the violence from the Jan. 8 arrest remained clear. In the account AP published, the injuries included eight skull fractures and five life-threatening brain hemorrhages, and he said the beating continued during his movement through custody facilities and medical treatment.

According to AP, ICE officers told nurses that the man “purposefully ran headfirst into a brick wall.” AP reported that Hennepin County Medical Center staff doubted the explanation immediately, and that a CT scan showed fractures to the front, back and both sides of his skull. AP said a doctor who reviewed the findings told the outlet that the pattern was inconsistent with a fall.

AP also reported that ICE’s account evolved while Castañeda Mondragón was in the hospital, citing court materials filed by a lawyer seeking his release and nurses who treated him. The article said at least one officer told staff he “got his (expletive) rocked,” and AP described how that account shifted as medical evidence mounted.

Castañeda Mondragón told AP that there was “never a wall,” and he said ICE officers struck him with the same metal rod used to break the windows of the vehicle he was in. He later identified the implement as a telescoping baton routinely carried by law enforcement, and AP reported that training materials and use-of-force policies commonly allow such batons to be used on arms, legs and the body but treat striking the head, neck or spine as potentially deadly force.

After he was taken to an ICE holding facility in suburban Minneapolis, AP reported that Castañeda Mondragón said officers resumed beating him and that he pleaded for a doctor but was met with laughter and further blows. AP reported that federal officials declined to investigate the excessive-force claim at the time of publication, while DHS did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

The government’s only acknowledgment of the injuries in the case, according to AP, came in a Jan. 20 court filing that said that during the arrest officials learned that Castañeda Mondragón “had a head injury that required emergency medical treatment.” AP also reported that the same filing said he entered the U.S. legally in March 2022, and that the agency determined after the arrest that he had overstayed his visa.

AP said a federal judge ruled the arrest was unlawful and ordered him released from ICE custody. The AP report also described how Minnesota officeholders moved in the wake of the allegations, including Gov. Tim Walz, who posted an AP story about the case on X. Sen. Tina Smith said in a statement that she was “seeing a repeated pattern of Trump Administration officials attempting to lie and gaslight the American people when it comes to the cruelty of this ICE operation in Minnesota,” and she urged accountability.

Local prosecutors and law enforcement also weighed in, according to AP. The Ramsey County Attorney’s Office urged Castañeda Mondragón to file a police report to prompt an investigation, AP reported, and he said he plans to file a complaint. A St. Paul police spokesperson told AP the department would investigate “all alleged crimes that are reported to us,” and AP reported that Rep. Kelly Morrison said she toured the Whipple Building at Fort Snelling and described what she said were severe overcrowding, unsanitary conditions and limited medical care. Rep. Betty McCollum similarly said that if a state or local officer did what she alleges federal agents did in Minnesota, accountability would follow, and she argued federal agents should face the same standard.