A clip, recorded inside an East Elmhurst apartment, shows ICE agents stepping through a doorway with guns drawn as a mother calls out from a back room, telling the officers that she’s holding her baby and pleading with them not to scare her children.
The video, first shown by Fox 5 NY, offers a clear look at how quickly the encounter escalated. Agents push inside the room with flashlights while the woman spoke to them, appearing confused. Her four young children, all U.S. citizens, were inside the apartment during the encounter.
Neighbors said they thought the family was being robbed. Several called 911 after seeing armed men at the door before sunrise. NYPD officers arrived, expecting to respond to a break-in, and instead found that the men with guns were federal agents carrying out an ICE operation.
The New York Immigration Coalition, which released the footage publicly, says what happened inside the home wasn’t just aggressive, it was improper. The group says the agents never showed a warrant, forced their way in, and pointed guns at the mother and her children. They also say the agents were searching for a man who doesn’t live there, the woman’s cousin, whom she says she has no relationship with.
In interviews with local outlets, Murad Awawdeh, the coalition’s president and CEO, said the video raises troubling questions about the way ICE conducts these raids. He pointed out that in the footage, agents appear to adjust a home security camera before entering further, something he believes was done to avoid being recorded. What struck him most, he said, was the impact on the children who watched the whole scene unfold at close range.
City officials have echoed those concerns. Councilmember Alexa Avilés, who chairs the immigration committee, said the incident looked chaotic and alarming, and that the family was left traumatized. She said the neighbors’ reaction alone, thinking a home invasion was underway, shows how intense and disorienting the scene was.
The Department of Homeland Security, however, disputes the account presented by advocates. In a statement similar to one given to Newsweek about the same incident, DHS said ICE agents and U.S. Marshals were trying to serve a criminal arrest warrant for Raymundo Gabriel Huerra-Betancourt.
According to the agency, his record includes assault, reckless driving, and illegal re-entry. DHS says the East Elmhurst address appears on his probation form and is also tied to his Social Security number and phone records. The woman in the video, the agency said, is his cousin.
DHS also said that claims agents pointed guns at the children are “false,” and that officers knocked for roughly 20 minutes before entering. Once inside, the agency says, they “safely guided” the mother and her children into the kitchen while they searched the apartment.
The coalition is calling for an investigation, and immigrant-rights groups are once again reminding families of their legal protections, including the right not to open the door without a judicial warrant.
For the family at the center of the video, the experience has left them shaken. The questions now focus on how a fast-moving raid at the wrong address left a Queens mother trying to calm her crying children while officers with guns swept through the place they consider home.
