Video of a woman being pulled away from her weeping daughters on a California street and shoved into a U.S. Customs and Border Protection vehicle has sparked criticism over the way federal agents are enforcing immigration laws.
The Border Patrol says Perla Morales-Luna was identified as an organizer for a transnational criminal smuggling organization and was arrested for being in the country illegally.
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The arrest March 3 in National City, a community south of San Diego, was described as “grotesque” by Benjamin Prado, co-ordinator for the American Friends Service Committee’s San Diego U.S.-Mexico Border Program.
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Prado tells the Los Angeles Times that he’s concerned about the “terror” the woman’s daughters suffered.
“If there weren’t uniformed agents, it would resemble a kidnapping,” Prado added in a statement to the Washington Post.
An attorney for Morales-Luna did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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