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Liam Conejo Ramos case update: Where is the Minneapolis boy, 5, detained by ICE? First details on father emerge
5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father are detained by ICE in Texas after being picked up in Minnesota.
A 5-year-old Minneapolis boy, Liam Conejo Ramos, is currently being held in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody in Texas along with his father, CNN reported.
The ICE agents detained Liam and his father in their Columbia Heights driveway on January 20.
Zena Stenvik, superintendent of the Columbia Heights Public Schools district, said in a press conference that both Liam and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, were picked up shortly after Liam returned home from preschool.
Read more: Who is Liam Ramos? ICE sparks outrage after detaining 5-year-old Minnesota boy
Details of the detention and where they are now?
Adrian, the father, and Liam have been detained at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, an ICE prison for families, a person familiar with Tuesday's circumstances told CNN.
The Dilley facility is not a criminal jail and is built to accommodate families and children ranging in age from newborns to teenagers. It consists of several beige trailers with rooms set aside for a classroom, gym, and library.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told CNN, “For the child’s safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended.”
The officials told CNN that the father ran away, “abandoning his child.” Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Gregory Bovino said in a press conference, “I didn’t detain a 5-year-old, and we’re going to continue with that law enforcement mission.”
Read more: Minneapolis anti-ICE protesters ‘targeting’ K-9s? DHS' post sparks outrage
Who is Father Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias?
According to the DHS, the father was allowed to enter the United States during the Biden administration.
They claimed that the operation's intended target was the father, who is from Ecuador. In the end, the two were detained together because “the child was ABANDONED.”
The family's lawyer, Mark Prokosch, said in a press conference that the family has an active asylum case and no deportation order. He added they were doing “every single thing the right way that they were supposed to.”
The lawyer is now worried that now the asylum claim will have to be processed with “half of the family in Texas.”
