Held in Federal Custody, a Baltimore Man Injured in an ICE Arrest Has Gone Eight Days Without Treatment

Lawyers for Ever Alvarenga Rios say his wounds have gone untreated since his release from a hospital into federal custody.

Photos: Alvarenga Rios family

Ever Alvarenga Rios was on his way to work on April 2 when, according to his attorneys, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement vehicle struck his van from behind on South Haven Street in the Highlandtown neighborhood of Baltimore, Md.

He was taken to Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, where he remained in ICE custody for four days, with federal agents restricting his ability to leave and maintaining supervision while he received medical care.

When he was discharged and transferred Sunday night to a downtown Baltimore holding facility, his attorneys say, he had not received follow-up care.

Eight days later, they say, that has not changed. His attorneys say he was transferred Thursday afternoon to the Elizabeth Detention facility in Elizabeth, N.J..

Clarissa Lindsey, an attorney representing Mr. Alvarenga Rios, visited him Thursday.

“I asked him if there had been a doctor that had seen him, a nurse, anyone of any sort of medical capacity,” Ms. Lindsey said. “He has seen no one.”

Medical Care and Access to Counsel

Mr. Alvarenga Rios, 32, came to the United States from Honduras in 2014 and has lived in Baltimore for more than a decade. He owns a hardwood floor restoration business and is active in his church community. His wife, Lurbin Vazquez, said he left Honduras after facing gang violence. An immigration judge issued a final order of removal in 2018, which ICE said it was enforcing at the time of the incident, when, Ms. Lindsey said, agents crashed into his van.

His legal team says he suffered bruising and abrasions to his face, forehead, hands, abdomen and shoulder, along with an ACL sprain requiring orthopedic follow-up within two to three weeks. Some of his wounds remain open, they said.

Mr. Alvarenga Rios shows his injuries while undergoing treatment at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center. (Photo: Eyni Mancia)

Ms. Lindsey said she could not determine which injuries resulted from the crash and which may have occurred during the arrest. During his hospitalization, she said, her only communication with him was a brief phone call with ICE agents present.

Her attempts to visit him in the hospital were denied, she said, with shifting explanations that included medical stabilization, paperwork issues and a policy barring legal access. A Baltimore City council member who attempted to visit was also turned away.

ICE’s acting Baltimore Field Office Director, Vernon Liggins, said claims that Mr. Alvarenga Rios had been denied access to counsel or family were “completely false.”

But Ms. Lindsey disputed that characterization, saying she and others were repeatedly denied access during his hospitalization.

“The Constitution guarantees that every person in the United States is entitled to due process of law,” she said. “Denying access to counsel at such a critical stage not only undermines our client’s rights, but also impairs the fact-finding process that is most effective immediately after an incident occurs.”

Since his discharge, his attorneys say, he has not been evaluated by any medical provider.

He has received only Tylenol, administered by detention officers, and has not been given the antibiotic ointment prescribed at discharge.

“I have no faith in any medical care to treat his injuries at any detention center,” Ms. Lindsey said, adding that his knee injury will likely require extensive rehabilitation.

The company involved in guarding Mr. Alvarenga Rios during his hospitalization, Paragon Professional Services, plays a key role in ICE’s detention system. The firm is the recipient of a $53 million federal contract to provide detainee transportation across the Northeast and beyond, linking the Baltimore field office to facilities in states as far away as Maine and North Carolina.

That network allows detainees to be moved across state lines quickly and with little notice — and has already come into play in Mr. Alvarenga Rios’s case, his attorneys said.

In one recent case, Dulce Consuelo Diaz Morales, a Maryland woman whose lawyers say she is a U.S. citizen, was transferred between facilities in multiple states during a 25-day detention, according to reporting by The Washington Post. Her attorneys told Project Salt Box the transfers made communication with her difficult.

Ms. Lindsey said Mr. Alvarenga Rios’s transfer to New Jersey could complicate access to counsel and continuity of care.

ICE did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

ICE Vehicle Collisions are “reckless”

The exact circumstances of the crash that led to Mr. Alvarenga Rios’s arrest remain in dispute. But similar vehicle-related encounters have occurred in immigration operations across the United States in recent months.

In one case in Chicago, federal officials accused a driver, Marimar Martinez, of ramming agents’ vehicles during an enforcement operation. A U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent then shot her multiple times. Martinez, a U.S. citizen, was charged with assaulting federal officers, but the Justice Department later dropped all charges. Defense attorneys said video and other evidence suggested the federal agents may have caused the collision.

And in Newark, N.J., a recent ICE pursuit led to a multi-vehicle crash involving several cars, including one carrying children, prompting local officials to call the agency’s tactics “reckless.”

Meanwhile, Ms. Vasquez, his wife, has begun speaking publicly about his condition. In his first call after the arrest, she said, he asked her to ensure his employees were paid. In a later call, she said he told her: “My love, I’m strong, because I know that you’re doing everything possible for me to get out of here.”

In an update posted to the Eldridge Crandell Instagram account Thursday morning, Ms. Lindsey said the collision used to carry out the arrest was a “dangerous” tactic that “put the greater community and their safety at risk.”

Meanwhile, students and staff affiliated with Johns Hopkins have also begun raising concerns about his condition. Among them is Natalie Wang, a medical student involved in organizing outreach to elected officials and hospital leadership, urging his release on medical grounds.

“In school, we are taught that we have a personal and professional duty to affirm human dignity and alleviate suffering,” Ms. Wang said. “Ever’s case shows what happens when that obligation is not met — from the way he was detained to the care he has received since. He has not been given the medications he was discharged with or the follow-up care he needs to recover, putting him at risk of infection and further complications. We are urging Baltimoreans to contact their elected officials in support of his release.”

A digital flyer circulating among Hopkins-affiliated students calls for officials to intervene and describes his arrest as an “assault.”

Dr. Kate Sugarman, a family physician who has spent more than two decades reviewing medical records inside ICE detention facilities and now works with Doctors for Camp Closure and the New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, said, “Not only did ICE cause serious injuries to Ever, but he is now not receiving the medical care he needs to recover.”

“Without proper wound care, hygiene, and follow-up treatment, he is at risk of infection, complications from head trauma, and potentially life-threatening issues like blood clots,” Dr. Sugarman said.