After a man was struck and killed by a SUV Thursday while running from a federal immigration enforcement operation at a Home Depot in Monrovia, California, immigrant communities are once again condemning the federal government’s tactics while mourning the crash victim.
The man who died on the 210 Freeway was identified as Roberto Carlos Montoya Valdez from Jutiapa, Guatemala, according to the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, which said the Guatemalan consulate had confirmed the identity.
Cellphone video from the deadly crash appears to show a passerby on the 210 Freeway, showing the body of a man who has been hit by a car just yards from where federal officers were arresting day laborers below.
The man ran from the scene, crossed Evergreen Avenue and entered the eastbound 210 Freeway, said Monrovia City Manager Dylan Feik. CHP officers said they received a report just before 10 a.m. that someone had been hit by a SUV on the freeway near Myrtle Avenue.
What exactly led up to the man running onto the freeway is unclear.
“Was it intentional? I don’t think that is the case, but it ended up with a father, a brother being killed,” said Pablo Alvarado, co-executive director of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network.
The Department of Homeland Security told NBC Los Angeles in a statement that Montoya Valdez was not being pursued by federal officials. But Alvarado blamed the federal officials’ tactics that, he said, created fear.
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“Whether they were chasing him or not, the fact is that when you have operations of this kind, the first reaction of any human being is to run.”
Many others in the same Home Depot parking lot also ran, according to people who witnessed or experienced the raid.
“My boss told me to run because immigration was there,” Mattias, a worker who escaped the raid, said in Spanish. “Some people ran regardless of their immigration status because nowadays, they don’t know if undocumented or documented people will be detained.”
Mattias said he hurt himself while jumping a fence.
DHS said eight day laborers were arrested during Thursday’s raid, including nationals from Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras. The department called the raid by U.S. Border Patrol a “targeted immigration enforcement operation,” but did not mention the death of Valdez.
