ICE detains local mother and store owner
By Rachel McConaghie
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COTTAGE GROVE, Oregon (KEZI) — Juanita Avila, a local business owner and mother in Cottage Grove, was one of several people across Lane County detained by ICE on November 5th. Avila, who has been a resident of Cottage Grove for 12 years and owns Juanita’s Latina Store located in downtown, has lived in the United States since she was 14 years old. She believes the incident was an act of racial profiling.
“They are actually racially profiling because we are Hispanic, they are targeting us,” Avila said.
On her drive home Wednesday evening, Avila was speaking to her daughter over the phone when in her rear view mirror she saw lights flash following close behind her.
“I saw the lights, and I thought it was police,” Avila said. “So I drove into a small road in there and so I just opened my window … and then all of a sudden, I see a guy coming towards me in a green shirt with a mask.”
Avila’s daughter, Emely Agustin, found her mother stopped on Pennoyer Avenue. Agustin captured video which appeared to show ICE agents using force to bring Avila to the ground. Avila recounted the experience, expressing confusion and distress at the situation.
“They took me out of the car, I don’t remember how they threw me to the floor,” Avila said. “I remember being on the floor and me screaming, ‘Why are you doing this?’ I was so scared.”
“They just grabbed me, they only question they said was ‘Where are you from?’ because I didn’t answer, like what, ‘Why is that?'” said Avila. “I was asking them why they pull me over and they say while I was screaming at them ‘Why did you lie to me? You’re not officers, you’re not police,’ because they said they were police, but they just lied and dragged me out for no reason.”
Since the Trump Administration began its immigration crackdown, Avila said she keeps her identification on her all the time. This includes her Green Card and REAL I.D.
“Originally, I had thought it was the police until I got out of the car and I saw their uniforms and the vehicles with no markings on them,” Agustin said about the detainment. “In that moment, I knew it was ICE, so I was screaming, ‘She has her Green Card somewhere on her, there’s no reason for this.'”
Once Emely had arrived to the scene, the ICE agents had seized Avila’s wallet using her REAL I.D. card to verify her citizenship status.
“They came up to me and they were like, ‘Oh, we need you to go through her wallet and find her Green Card because we’re not allowed to search through your wallet,'” Agustin said. “And I was like in my head, I was like, ‘Well you already did, that doesn’t make any sense?'”
Avila said she was detained by Ice agents for under an hour in handcuffs before being released.
“I was assaulted, and these random people just come and do this,” Avila said. “I’m terrified, the whole neighborhood is terrified. People with citizenship, legal to be here, they don’t want to go out of their houses because they’re scared that if this happened to me because they know me … everybody knows me. They say if this happened to her, what’s going to happen to us?”
Community members are rallying around Avila showing support as they condemn what they say was an unjust detainment. Throughout my interview with Avila and Agustin, Cottage Grove residents came into Juanita’s Latina Store to buy items and bring cards with supportive comments.
KEZI 9 reached out to ICE for information on who was all arrested on November 5th across Lane County and what, if any, charges they could be facing.
On November 9th, public affairs officer for ICE, Chrissy Cuttita said in a statement:
“ICE conducts targeted enforcement actions in accordance with the law, focusing on individuals who violate immigration laws. Claims suggesting that ICE indiscriminately targets random individuals are false and contribute to unwarranted fear within the community.
ICE conducts targeted enforcement actions that are based on intelligence driven leads focused on aliens identified for arrest and removal from the United States. During lawful immigration enforcement activities in Lane County, Oregon on Nov. 5, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations teams arrested nine illegal aliens in Cottage Grove and one illegal alien in Eugene. None of them were lawfully in the United States and even have criminal background. One had an order of removal and another had a previous voluntary return they did not honor.
All aliens who remain in the U.S. without a lawful immigration status may be subject to arrest and removal. For such aliens, the safest and most efficient option is self-deportation. Tools such as the CBP Home app are available to support the self-deportation process.”
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