Father of 5-year-old detained in Minnesota disputes government assertion he abandoned the boy

Father of 5 year old child detained by immigration officials He was held at a federal facility in Texas on Monday and denied government accounts that he had abandoned his son. The couple returned to Minnesota.

Adrian Conejo Arias, originally from Ecuador, told ABC News that he loves his son Liam and would never abandon him. Statements from the Department of Homeland SecurityIt was claimed that Arias left her child in the vehicle. He also said his son became ill while in federal custody but was not given medication.

Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that Arias fled on foot, “abandoning her child” before being arrested. He said Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers stayed with the child.

“The facts in this case have not changed: The father, who was in the country illegally, chose to take his child with him to a detention center,” he said.

McLaughlin did not address Arias’ statement that her son was denied medication while in custody.

Arias also said that he was unjustly detained and that he was in the country legally, while his asylum case was pending.

Comments come after a while federal judge orders The couple was released over the weekend. They were released Sunday and returned to Minnesota, according to Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro.

The family’s arrest and release come amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration, which has led to daily protests that have included the shooting deaths of two American citizens by federal officers. President last week ordered The top border adviser who will oversee the days of pressure that followed the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, 37, a critical care nurse at a Veterans Affairs hospital.

Border czar Tom Homan suggested errors but he said agents would continue to enforce federal law and called on local and state officials to cooperate with federal authorities.

The boy’s detention sparked outrage after footage emerged of immigration officers surrounding the young boy in a blue bunny hat and Spider-Man backpack.

McLaughlin said ICE did not target or arrest the boy and repeated his mother’s claims that he refused to take him in after his father was captured. He said his father told officers he wanted Liam to be with him.

McLaughlin also said last month that the child was abandoned and that police were trying to give custody of the child to the mother. “Officers even assured him that he would not be detained.”

Neighbors and school officials said federal agents used the boy as “bait” and told him to knock on the door of his mother’s home to get her to come out. DHS disputed this statement.

Marcos Charles, ICE deputy administrator for enforcement and removal operations, accused the father of “abandoning his child in a vehicle in the dead of winter.” He told reporters that one officer remained with the child while others arrested the father.

The government said the child’s father entered the United States illegally from Ecuador in December 2024. The family’s attorney said the child has a pending asylum request that allows him to remain in the United States.

The vast majority of asylum seekers are released in the United States; While adults have the right to obtain a work permit, their cases are going through a backlog of court systems.

Ecuadorians who have fled in droves in recent years as their country spiraled into violence have fared poorly in immigration court, with judges granting asylum in 12.5% ​​of decisions made in the 12 months through September, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a data collection and research organization based at Syracuse University.

U.S. District Judge Fred Biery, who ordered the release of Liam and his father, criticized the administration, writing that the case “apparently arose from the government’s ill-conceived and clumsily enforced daily deportation quotas, even when they involved traumatizing the children.”

An online court filing from the Justice Department’s Executive Office of Immigration Review states that there will be no future hearings for Liam’s father.