Did ICE detain a 5 year old and his father?
Executive summary
School officials, the family's lawyer and multiple news outlets report that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained a 5‑year‑old Minneapolis‑area boy, Liam Conejo Ramos, and his father after the child returned from preschool; the pair were reportedly transported to a family detention facility in Dilley, Texas [1] [2] [3]. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE counter that the boy was not the target of the operation and say the father fled officers, leaving the child in the agents' care before both were taken into custody [3] [4] [5].
1. The core claim: what multiple local sources say happened
Columbia Heights Public Schools officials and the family's lawyer said masked ICE officers approached the father in the driveway as the boy arrived home from preschool, then removed both child and father and eventually transported them to a Texas detention center; the family's attorney, Marc Prokosch, told reporters he believed both were being held in Dilley, Texas [1] [2] [4] [3].
2. The federal account and how it differs
DHS spokespeople have stressed ICE was conducting a "targeted operation" against the father — identified by DHS as Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias — and assert the child was not targeted; DHS further stated the father “fled on foot — abandoning his child,” and that officers remained with the child while they arrested the father [3] [4] [5].
3. School district, lawyer and community framing
Local officials and the family’s lawyer say the child was effectively taken into custody alongside his father and that community members view the episode as part of a pattern: Columbia Heights leaders say four students in the district have been detained recently, and school officials charged that ICE agents used the 5‑year‑old as “bait” to draw other relatives out [6] [7] [8]. The district superintendent and teachers expressed shock and described a community in fear following multiple detentions [1] [6].
4. Where reporting converges and diverges on custody and location
News outlets consistently report that both the child and father were removed and that the family’s lawyer and school officials believe they were transferred to a detention center in Dilley, Texas [2] [3] [4]. Federal statements emphasize the operation’s target was the father and characterize his alleged flight as the reason officers temporarily supervised the child; DHS did not, in the cited reporting, explain why the child was later transported to the processing center rather than released to another caretaker [3] [4] [5].
5. Political and public reactions, and possible agendas in coverage
The detentions prompted swift political backlash and public fundraising for the family; elected officials and advocates framed the incident as excessive enforcement against children, while DHS framed its messaging to emphasize a lawful operation against an individual with immigration exposure, an emphasis that shifts public attention from the optics of a detained preschooler to procedural justification [9] [4] [10]. Local officials’ claims that children were used as “bait” and DHS’s insistence the child was not targeted represent competing narratives with distinct public‑relations aims: one frames a humanitarian violation, the other defends enforcement tactics [6] [3].
6. Remaining uncertainties and limits of reporting
Open questions remain in the public record cited here: whether the father indeed fled as DHS describes, the precise chronology of when and why the child was placed into federal custody rather than with another adult who offered to care for him, and whether any court or ICE records document the legal basis for detaining the child with his father; the sources provided do not supply those operational documents or a DHS explanation for why the child was transported to Dilley rather than left locally [4] [3] [11]. Based on the reporting compiled here, the accurate, evidence‑backed answer is that multiple reputable outlets, the school district and the family’s lawyer report that ICE detained both the 5‑year‑old and his father and that both were taken to a Texas facility, while DHS maintains the child was not the target and contends the father abandoned the child during the arrest [1] [2] [3] [4].