Illinois police probe injury of US citizen wrongly detained by federal agents

Police in Evanston, a Chicago suburb, are investigating an incident in which federal immigration agents detained a man who was later found with injuries to his head, neck and teeth. Officers responding to a reported argument between two men on Sunday morning found the injured man on the ground, surrounded by people helping him.

Officers questioned a plainclothes man wearing a vest marked "police" who was seated in one of two SUVs at the scene. He identified himself as a federal agent conducting a fugitive investigation, telling officers that agents had tried to identify someone resembling a person they were seeking. According to the agent, the individual refused to show identification, was detained for fingerprinting, and resisted. Agents later determined he was not their target but a US citizen, and released him.

An officer noticed blood on the agent's hands; the agent said he was injured while trying to handcuff the man. The police statement did not name the agency involved, but witnesses told officers they believed the agents were from ICE. The agent said five federal officers had been working the area in unmarked vehicles under a warrant for someone with a Chicago address, and that the agents left after protesters began gathering, fearing they would be attacked.

The wrongly detained man, an adult Evanston resident, was later located at a hospital, where officers photographed and documented his injuries. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The incident occurred the same day ICE agents shot and seriously wounded a 28-year-old Venezuelan man in Austin, Texas, during an encounter that followed a traffic stop while he was making a food delivery. He remained hospitalized in serious but stable condition.

Both cases come amid an intensifying immigration crackdown under the Trump administration, which saw a record 50,000 arrests in July — more than half involving people with no criminal record. In July, an ICE officer also fatally shot 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston.