STAMFORD – Three unmarked cars with tinted windows converge on a man as he walks out of state Superior Court on Hoyt Street.
Five or six law enforcement agents exit their vehicles and approach the man. The agents have guns on their hips, and vests that say “FBI,” or “POLICE Federal Officer,” or “ERO,” for Enforcement and Removal Operations, a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, better known as ICE.
The agents wear masks, ball caps, sunglasses and street clothes – no uniforms or badges. They handcuff the man. He does not resist. They put him in one of their cars and drive away.
A resident captures the activity on his cellphone. He asks the law enforcement agents who they are but they wave him off. He keeps his distance.
Such scenarios play out almost daily at the Stamford courthouse, where ICE agents go in search of undocumented people making court appearances for immigration check-ins, on civil matters, and in criminal cases that – a day spent in a courtroom shows – involve charges such as domestic disturbance, driving while intoxicated, breach of peace, and minor assault.
Members of grassroots groups who say they are concerned about unidentified law enforcement agents taking people off the streets and transporting them to unknown detention facilities are on the scene filming with their phones. Group members say ICE agents are scrambling to meet a quota set by President Donald Trump to arrest 3,000 undocumented immigrants a day, and because of that agents are targeting day laborers, housekeepers and landscapers rather than hunting dangerous criminals.
Grassroots groups say the result is ICE tactics that violate a guarantee under the U.S. Constitution that all people, regardless of immigration status, have the right to an attorney and a court hearing when charges are made against them.
David Michel, a former state representative from Stamford who is documenting ICE activity at the courthouse, said if one person’s constitutional rights are trampled, all can be trambled. The nation’s immigration policy is creating confusion, fear and trauma, Michel said.
Earlier this month he filmed the apprehension of a young New York man who was in court after he was issued a speeding ticket in Stamford. Law enforcement agents grabbed the man on the sidewalk on Hoyt Street while his wife watched.
“I saw her heart break in front of me. Then his mother came and fell to the sidewalk crying. I cried, too,” Michel said. “You don’t see this and not feel it. Life is precious – to see the separation of people who love each other is painful. To say it’s dehumanizing is not strong enough.”
The worst of the worst
The young man’s family said he has been awaiting his green card, officially called a permanent resident card, which allows a non-citizen to live and work in the U.S. It means the person has permanent resident status and may pursue U.S. citizenship.
The man’s wife said he was taken to Hartford, where there is an Immigration Court that falls under the Department of Justice, and then to an ICE detention center in the Boston area. ICE is part of the Department of Homeland Security.
“Homeland Security and the Justice Department are coordinating with other agencies in a manner analogous to a task force. All the other agencies fall under them,” said Robert Strang of New York, CEO of Investigative Management Group and a veteran of the FBI and DEA.
The Trump administration and supporters of his mass deportation program say those who enter the country illegally break the law, and borders must be protected and immigration policies enforced. The Trump administration says ICE targets “the worst of the worst” – murderers, rapists and gang members.
But ICE records show that few detainees have been convicted of violent crimes. According to records from Oct. 1, 2024 to May 31, 2025, more than 75 percent of the 185,000 people in ICE custody had no criminal convictions other than immigration or traffic offenses. Fewer than 10 percent had been convicted of violent crimes.
The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a Syracuse University organization that gathers federal government data, reports that, as of last month, U.S. immigration courts received 431,343 new cases during fiscal 2025. Among those cases, fewer than 1.5 percent sought deportation orders based on alleged crimes, apart from possible illegal entry into the country, TRAC reports.
In Connecticut, like elsewhere in the country, ICE is targeting not only courthouses but car washes, restaurants, garden centers, FedEx offices, Home Depot stores, farms, landscaping companies and other businesses where they believe they can find undocumented people at work.
‘People are scared’
In Bridgeport, attorney Dennis Bradley said he has recently “lost” 10 clients to ICE raids.
On July 10, Bradley said, “six to eight of these guys dressed all in black, wearing full assault gear, with masks and dark sunglasses grabbed my clients outside the courthouse who were there on minor domestic violence charges and for drunk driving. It was overkill to a degree you wouldn’t believe. They are picking up roofers and people who work in restaurant kitchens. People are scared. They don’t want to go to court to pay their motor vehicle tickets for fear of getting picked up. These are Hispanic people exclusively that they are grabbing up. I represent Irish and English people who have overstayed their visas and they are not being touched.”
The law enforcement agents “have jackets with ‘FBI’ on them and they are driving unmarked cars and they are using plastic ties to take people into custody,” Bradley said. “They are waiting up at the municipal parking lot across from city hall and when they spot the person … they go after them. I had a guy the other day who was walking to the courthouse to check in for a diversionary program he is on and they chased him all the way into the courthouse.”
That’s what’s happening, said attorney Phil Berns of Stamford, who has handled immigration cases for two decades.
“To get to 3,000 arrests a day, ICE and ERO officers have to grab everybody they can,” Berns said. “They say they want to make the country safer; instead, they’re picking up nannies and gardeners.”
The Connecticut Trust Act prohibits law enforcement officers from arresting people based only on a request from ICE that they be detained for up to 48 hours so a federal agent can pick them up. The act provides exceptions – people are detained if they have been convicted of a Class A or B felony; if the detainer includes a judge’s warrant; or if the person is on a terrorist watch list.
When the act was passed 12 years ago, state lawmakers said the purpose was to balance public safety with establishing trust in immigrant communities so everyone feels safe reporting crimes.
“That’s why Connecticut is a so-called sanctuary state, but it means almost nothing,” Berns said. “ICE is federal, so agents are allowed to go where they want and do what they want, and that’s what they’re doing. In Stamford they post one car to the east of the courthouse, one to the west, and one across the street, and they corner people as they come out. They rip husbands from wives, kids from mothers. The state government is supposed to follow its rules, and the federal government is supposed to follow its rules, but the rules have changed.”
The law, he said, is being interpreted in a different way.
The ‘3.5 percent rule’
Besides the constitutional right to a fair legal process, undocumented people have the right to a “credible fear” interview, Berns said.
The interview is a way to assess people who say they fear returning to their home country. It’s to determine whether they have valid reason to seek asylum in the U.S. before they are deported.
Determining eligibility for asylum is “very tricky” and requires evidence, Berns said. “About 90 percent of people do not qualify as it’s written under the law. Some qualify but don’t have sufficient proof,” he said.
It’s not clear whether “credible fear” interviews are taking place, given the volume of cases. TRAC reports that, at the end of last month, there was a backlog of nearly 3.5 million cases in Immigration Court nationwide, and 2.2 million immigrants who’d filed asylum applications were waiting for hearings or decisions.
Dan Edelstein of Greenwich said he joined the loosely knit group observing ICE at the Stamford courthouse to help ensure that the nation’s system of laws is upheld.
“We are a country of laws, not a country of men. If we don’t obey the laws as written, we are on our way toward authoritarianism,” Edelstein said. “I grew up in San Francisco and was very involved in efforts to end the Vietnam war and to support civil rights. I didn’t realize how much a part of me is tied up in that.”
He believes in the “3.5 percent rule,” a political science tenet that if at least 3.5 percent of the population persistently protests nonviolently against a government, it’s likely to fall from power.
“We can’t stand by. We each have to do something,” Edelstein said. “The issue is not that immigrants who commit crimes should not go to jail. Criminals should go to jail. The issue is whether they are granted due process under the law. The issue is whether our Constitution is being ignored.”
‘Stay out of Danbury!’
Protesters such as Michel and Edelstein are showing up nationwide at places where ICE agents are apprehending immigrants.
A July 15 video on FaceBook shows three cars occupied by ICE and other agents parked on a residential street in Danbury, and a man with a bullhorn shouting repeatedly, “Stay out of Danbury!” and “Get out of here!”
A group called the Save America Movement is fundraising to launch a fleet of “liberty vans” with lawyers and camera crews on board to “follow ICE raids in real time, film them, and show the world what’s happening in our communities.”
Berns said he thinks the citizens observing ICE activity “are doing God’s work, but I hope the government doesn’t start going after them – it’s a crime to assist an illegal immigrant.”
Federal law prohibits smuggling undocumented immigrants into the U.S.; transporting them within the country; and “harboring” them, which includes shielding them from detection or providing financial support, housing or transportation.
“I am aware of the risks,” said Leonardo Filgueiras of Stamford, one of those documenting ICE activity at the Stamford courthouse. “I’m very confident we have everything we need to legally, peacefully, defeat this threat to our rights. We need to shine a light on what’s happening.”
The anonymity of the law enforcement officers is disturbing, Filgueiras said.
“I saw men with masks and guns and bullet-proof vests, jumping into the street and going from one unmarked car to another,” he said. “For what reason? We are not being invaded. We are not being attacked. Anyone can get a bullet-proof vest and start snatching people up. I want to help move our country away from this.”
Department of Homeland Security officials have said masking is necessary because the jobs of ICE agents in the field are increasingly dangerous. People capture photos of agents on their phones and use facial recognition technology to identify them, then “dox” them by posting their personal information online. That in the middle of a supercharged political environment puts agents at risk, DHS officials say.
Critics say masking heightens the tension.
“Their cars have super-tinted windows. Sometimes you can see their hands but you really can’t see their faces,” said Michel, one of the ICE observers. “People walking by don’t like it. They start filming them. They say, ‘Shame on you! Shame on you!’ It’s not a good situation.”
10,000 more ICE agents
On Tuesday Connecticut Attorney General William Tong joined a coalition of 21 attorneys general in sending a letter to members of Congress, urging them to pass legislation prohibiting ICE agents from wearing masks and requiring them to show identification.
“These masked commandos in unmarked vans trigger dangerous panic and confusion,” Tong said in a statement. “The possibility of a misunderstanding puts officers and civilians at needless risk. There is zero need for these hyper-aggressive tactics when we’re talking about unarmed mothers taking their children to school, college students walking to class, or people just trying to do the right thing by showing up to court hearings and immigration check-ins.”
Fear is everywhere, Michel said. Volunteers from faith-based organizations are grocery shopping for Haitian families who are afraid to leave their homes, he said.
A veteran immigration lawyer practicing in Hartford told CT Examiner it would hamper his ability to represent clients if he spoke publicly about ICE tactics.
Owners of small businesses told CT Examiner they are afraid they will not be able to replace employees lost to ICE raids, and will have to close.
John Jairo Lugo, director of Unidad Latina en Acción, a New Haven organization that supports immigrants and workers, said he’s waiting for the money to flow from the budget bill Trump just signed into law. It set aside $170 billion for immigration enforcement, including $75 billion for ICE, which will make it the nation’s biggest law enforcement agency.
“It moved the money from support for poor people to ICE, to hire 10,000 more agents,” Jairo Lugo said. “Connecticut has not been hit as hard as some other places so far, but it will get harder in the next months. We have to get ready for it.”
ICE’s Office of Public Affairs provides an email address for the press, but no one responded to questions sent there. The FBI office in New Haven directs members of the media to a phone line that just hangs up.
– Staff Writers Dan Tepfer and Andy Thibault contributed to this report.