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SACRAMENTO, CA (KTXL) — A man living in the U.S. illegally is suing ICE for damages totaling $750,000, alleging battery, assault and false imprisonment.
“They told me that if I did not sign, they were going to go after my family and that they knew where my family lived,” Carlos Rueda said Wednesday.
Rueda claims ICE agents first picked him up March 3, 2017 and demanded he identify other undocumented people or face arrest and possible deportation.
“I was afraid. I was really afraid. I was spooked,” Rueda said.
He says this happened monthly for six months until September 2017, when he stopped giving up names.
That’s when Rueda says three Sacramento ICE agents got violent.
“Three of the agents came behind me and began to twist my arms, hitting me. Then they put my neck on the table and told me that I needed to sign,” Rueda said.
Rueda says the agents tried to coerce him to sign his own deportation papers and told him he did not have a right to an attorney.
“To detain and to coerce someone into signing a deportation order and to get someone to waive their right to counsel is unprecedented,” Luis Angel Reyes Savalza, Rueda’s attorney, said Thursday.
Savalza says this case is unlike any he’s worked before, especially given that Rueda doesn’t have a criminal history.
“Carlos has no criminal records. He’s never been arrested,” he said. “He’s never had any run-ins with the law enforcement of any kind.”
While most people living in the country illegally fear encounters with ICE, Rueda is now taking on the agency in court.
Savalza says during his detention, Rueda was denied medical attention from injuries he received from alleged abuse from agents.
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