The undocumented Mexican immigrant whose chaotic arrest ended with ICE agents shooting his girlfriend’s unarmed son in the face was led out of a Brooklyn hospital in shackles Friday, as protesters tried in vain to stop authorities from taking the man away.
Chanting “No estás solo” — you are not alone — angry protesters tried to block an unmarked black SUV from driving away with Gaspar Avenando-Hernandez, who had been in custody at Maimonides Medical Center since his arrest the day before.
Video posted on social media showed authorities pushing several people out of the vehicle’s path, as one person off-screen shouted “Abolish ICE!”
“In trying to obstruct, to stop ICE from taking a neighbor, we’re going to do what we can,” said Chloe Breyer, director of the Interfaith Center of New York. “The primary fault lies with the agency that views itself as unaccountable to the rule of law.”
Authorities grabbed Avendano-Hernandez at his Gravesend home Thursday morning as the 33-year-old construction laborer was returning from work to grab something left behind, sources and witnesses said.
As the confrontation escalated, the two sons of Avendano-Hernandez’s girlfriend came out of the house to intervene. One son, Eric Diaz-Cruz, was tasered and shot in the face, while Avendano-Hernandez was also zapped with a taser.
Diaz-Cruz was awaiting surgery at Maimonides Medical Center, his mother said Friday.
“I just want to say thank you, thank you for the support. My son is stable and thank you for being here,” said Carmen Cruz outside the hospital Friday. “We do not feel alone in this.”
Earlier in day, Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams called on ICE agents to start wearing body cameras like NYPD officers, so their actions could be more transparent.
“The question of ICE is what happened inside that house, and we state that we can remove the question if we can have ICE … have the same video surveillance that our police officers are required to have,” Adams said at the hospital. “There should be no questions of what happened in the day of technology.”
A Mexican diplomat said Diaz-Cruz is in the country legally with a visa.
ICE issued a statement Thursday describing Avendano-Hernandez as “a twice-removed illegal alien from Mexico with a 2011 assault conviction in New York City.”
But elected officials on Friday demanded that ICE respect New York’s sanctuary city status and stand down.
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“We don’t believe ICE should be here in our schools, in our courtrooms. This is a sanctuary city and we want to make sure that sanctuary mind set is carried out.”
Mayor Bill de Blasio called the federal agency an “illegitimate force.”
“It’s a highly politicized agency,” de Blasio said during an interview with NY1 on Friday. “It’s basically a wing of the Donald Trump campaign at this point.
*see full story by nydailynews.com