A federal agent is facing felony assault and child endangerment charges in Riverside County after being caught on camera detaining a 17-year-old boy at gunpoint. The teenager was headed home from a house party on November 10 at the time of the confrontation
Video footage of the encounter—obtained by the law firm Kirakosian Law, and shared exclusively with L.A. TACO—shows off-duty federal agent Gerardo Rodriguez wearing shorts and standing outside of his home on Daybrook Terrace just after 10 p.m. in an affluent part of Temecula, where houses sell for over $2 million.
As a 17-year-old driver in a pickup truck drives towards Rodriguez, the federal agent is seen retrieving a firearm from his waistband and pointing the gun at the teen.
“Stop, stop, slow down,” Rodriguez shouts, as the 17-year-old drives slightly past the officer before coming to a stop.
“Freeze, police,” Rodriguez says as he approaches the car with his weapon still drawn. “Put the car in fucking park.”
Rodriguez then orders the teenager out of the truck at gun point, and begins interrogating him.
“You’re speeding in the fucking neighborhood,” Rodriguez shouts.
Greg Kirakosian, a Los Angeles-based civil rights attorney who is representing the 17-year-old, told L.A. TACO that there was a house party down the street from where Rodriguez lives and that there were two cars driving in front of his home prior to the incident with his client, which prompted the off-duty agent to come outside armed with a firearm.
“Our client was driving in the opposite direction on his way home, following a call from his mother,” Kirakosian said.
During the detainment, neighbors who overheard Rodriguez yelling came out and begged Rodriguez to stop what he was doing, Kirakosian said.
After detaining and questioning the teen for nearly 20 minutes, Rodriguez eventually let the 17-year-old go without charging him or citing him with anything.
Fearing that the stop was immigration-related, the teenager's parents rushed over to the scene with their son’s passport, after a friend alerted them to what was happening.
Once there, the parents called the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.
Deputies responded to the 32000 block of Daybrook Terrace at around 10:41 PM, according to a press release from the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department. The father of the 17-year-old told deputies that his son was stopped by Rodriguez while driving home.
“Deputies were also told that [Rodriguez] displayed a badge and ordered the juvenile out of the vehicle at gunpoint,” the press release says.
Early that morning, Riverside County deputies with the department’s Southwest Station Investigation Bureau obtained a warrant to search Rodriguez’s home and collected evidence related to the investigation, the department confirmed.
Rodriguez was booked for assault by a public officer, assault with a deadly weapon, and child endangerment, according to jail records. The 46-year-old posted bail the same day he was arrested (Nov. 11) and is due back in court on December 26.
When asked what police agency Rodriguez works for, an unnamed spokesperson for the Riverside Sheriff’s Department told L.A. TACO, “The Riverside Sheriff’s Office does not release employer information.”
Kirakosian said, on the night Rodriguez was arrested, that a deputy or detective told the mother of the teen that Rodriguez works for "ICE." And he spoke to multiple witnesses and people who know Rodriguez personally, who all confirmed that he works for "ICE."
Representatives for the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) could not be reached for comment before publishing.
On Monday afternoon, an unnamed DHS spokesperson told L.A. TACO via email, "DHS cannot comment on matters still under review." Later that evening, an unnamed spokesperson for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) wrote in another email: "This matter is under investigation."
Rodriguez’s arrest comes at a time when there have been a number of other high profile instances of federal immigration officers drawing their weapons on unarmed people.
A few days before Rodriguez was arrested, a federal immigration agent in plainclothes was seen on video pulling a gun on a community watch member in Santa Ana, who had been following the agent from a distance in a car. A Fullerton police officer intervened before learning that the man who brandished the gun was an ICE agent.
And earlier this month, a U.S. citizen in Ontario was shot in the arm by an ICE agent, after they tried to notify federal immigration agents that there were kids across the street from where agents were conducting a raid.
“Finally, we got an ICE agent who crossed the line so bad, he got arrested,” Kirakosian said in a statement to L.A. TACO. “This is something I think our local law enforcement has to start doing with such clear examples of unnecessary tactics.”
“This can’t just end with some charges . . . DHS has to start answering for what their agents are doing and explain how they’ve become so emboldened that they think they can now turn their own neighborhoods into ICE checkpoints,” Kirakosian continued.
The teenager and parents mentioned in this story did not want their names to appear in this report due to safety concerns.
