A IMMIGRATION AND Customs Enforcement agent stands outside a Cornwall home where he and his colleagues arrested two men performing on the roof on Saturday and whisked them away — apparently without showing any warrants.
Photo provided by Mary Richards

CORNWALL — Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents took two roofers into custody over the weekend while they were doing work on a Cornwall woman’s home.

Mary Richards said ICE agents never approached her to tell her what was going on nor what authority they had to be on her property, and they never showed her any warrants during the Aug. 8 arrests.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement Boston Field Office, which is responsible for New England, did not respond to a Monday email request to questions, including the reason for the arrests and for warrants, by deadline on Wednesday.

Richards only noticed that ICE was at her North Bingham Street home around 12:30 p.m. when she happened to get up and look out her front window, where she noticed a large black vehicle with dark windows parked on the street. After going outside to investigate, she saw an agent and then ran to her neighbor’s house to ask them to come out as well.

“It was unbelievable,” Richards told the Independent.

The arrested men, identified for now as Alex and Angel, were at Richards’s Cornwall house along with seven others for a second day in a row of work on her roof. But on Saturday, multiple ICE agents arrived in three unmarked vehicles and arrested two of the workers for being in the U.S. without authorization.

The men are now being held in a Massachusetts detention center, according to an Aug. 10 statement released by State Sen. Ruth Hardy on her campaign website.

Others near the property who felt at risk by the ICE agents ran away from the scene, Will Lambek, a spokesman for the organization Migrant Justice, told the Independent. Migrant Justice’s Rapid Response Network responded to a call about the arrests and provided support for those affected in the area. At least 20 neighbors and members of the group Indivisible Middlebury also arrived on the scene after the agents left, said Tanya Byker, Cornwall selectboard chair.

Richards captured some of the raid on camera. In the video, as the vehicles are pulling away, she can be heard shouting, “You can’t just take people! You can’t just take people.”

She also repeatedly yells, “Do you have a warrant? Do you have a warrant? Do you have a warrant?”

The entire interaction lasted fewer than 10 minutes. Richards made that estimation based on time stamps of when she first noticed the vehicle in front of her house and when the video showing the end of the interaction starts.

Migrant Justice was eventually contacted, Richards said, and the organization helped the other seven people, who fled from Richards’s home, to a sanctuary space.

In subsequent call with the Independent, Richards emphasized that the raid at her home was at a private property.

It was also a point of emphasis in Hardy’s Aug. 10 statement.

“Let me be clear: this ICE raid at a private residence and abduction of people without a legal warrant or public safety reason is unacceptable, and it is traumatic for everyone involved,” she wrote.

The statement continues, “the roofing crew members, the homeowner and her family, neighbors in Cornwall, and passers-by were all frightened and angered. The situation was chaotic, executed without proper communication, and resulted in an unsafe situation for workers on the roof and neighbors who were confronted by armed federal agents. It was unfathomable to everyone that the federal government could simply take people, clearly based on racial and ethnic profiling.”

Hardy notes in the statement that she visited Richards the following day, and at that time also spoke with the crew manager.

“The crew manager described how traumatized her workers were and how she and others were stepping up to try to finish the job with a smaller and more-stressed crew,” Hardy wrote.

She also links to a GoFundMe that as of Wednesday afternoon had raised $5,300 “to support the families and legal defense of Alex and Angel.”

“Community members are organizing, staying vigilant, and adding to a network of people who are working to prevent further ICE abductions,” Hardy said in her statement.

The Saturday ICE activity in Cornwall came just a day after five people on their way to a construction job site were arrested in a traffic stop by ICE agents in Londonderry, Vt., around 9 a.m.

Lambek said there were a number of ICE arrests and traffic stops in the Upper Valley region spanning Vermont and New Hampshire over the past week, including in White River Junction.

On July 7, three Addison County residents were taken into custody by federal immigration officials in Middlebury.

“It was a traumatic, upsetting experience for the resident and the workers,” Byker said of the Cornwall raid. “It was heartening to see all the neighbors come to support.”

Byker said that she’s sees a lot of news about ICE nationally, but the arrests happening in Cornwall came as a shock.

As ICE arrests come closer to home for many in the Green Mountain State, Lambek urged Vermonters to always look out for their neighbors and keep them safe.

For those targeted by ICE or U.S. Border Patrol, Lambek emphasized knowing your rights — especially the right to remain silent and ask for an attorney. He recommended always calling the Migrant Justice Emergency Hotline: 802-881-7229.

Witnesses to ICE or Border Patrol arrests can also call Migrant Justice, Lambek said, to report information and identify the situation. Lambek cautioned about posting on social media before calling the hotline and encouraged only posting verified facts to prevent rumors and misinformation.