Federal agents were spotted in Lake Bluff on Tuesday making a possible immigration arrest, according to a local organization, a rare occurrence months after Operation Midway Blitz ended.
The Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) said its Lake County Rapid Response Team reported an “apparent [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] ICE abduction” in Lake Bluff around 11:30 a.m. Tuesday.
The arrest occurred in the 500 block of Moffet Road, near Center Avenue.
At least four federal agents were present and two of them had masks, ICIRR said.
They were driving a white Ford SUV and the group said the agents may still be in the area later in the day on Tuesday. They urged people to be “alert.”
“Remember: You have the right to film police activity, the right to remain silent, the right to speak to an attorney, and the right to refuse to sign anything,” the ICIRR said.
A video reviewed by Lake and McHenry County Scanner captured the encounter, which showed a man being arrested by agents.
The man could be heard telling them he does not speak English as they asked him if he had any weapons on him. One of the agents could be heard referring to the man’s “paperwork.”
Lake Bluff Chief of Police Matthew Smizinski told Lake and McHenry County Scanner that his department received a report of an individual taken into custody in Lake Bluff by agents from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
“Lake Bluff Police officers were not present at the time. The agents had not communicated with us the reason for taking the individual into custody,” Smizinski said.
The police chief said he did not know whether the arrest was immigration-related or for a criminal offense.
DHS has a multitude of agencies under its umbrella, including ICE and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).
While ICE focuses on immigration matters, HSI investigates a variety of federal crimes such as child exploitation, narcotics smuggling, cybercrime and financial crime.
DHS previously said there were several thousand arrests during Operation Midway Blitz, part of the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown, in the Chicago area last year. It started in September and wound down in November.