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ICE mistakenly arrested 2 men in the Bronx, then mounted cover-up, US judge rules
By
Arya Sundaram
Published Oct 9, 2026
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Blake Fagan / AFP via Getty Images
By
Arya Sundaram
Published Oct 9, 2026
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A federal judge in New York has rebuked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, concluding they lied in sworn testimony and falsified official records to justify the illegal arrests of two Hispanic men, including a U.S. citizen, in the Bronx in May.
In his excoriating 28-page opinion, Judge Gary R. Brown wrote that ICE agents mistakenly arrested the two men in physically aggressive confrontations, and later tried to legitimize the arrests by offering “inconsistent, false and misleading testimony” in court and charges they “falsified official records trying to conceal their illegal actions.”
Brown also criticized the officers’ training, stating they were inexperienced and lacked knowledge of the law and agency policies and procedures, and resorted to "false testimony to conceal these failings."
“Given the false testimony and records supplied to the Court and the other matters revealed, further action must be considered,” wrote Brown, who began his tenure on the District Court for the Eastern District of New York in 2019. He was nominated by President Donald Trump earlier that year.
Brown ruled that the arrests were illegal and required lawyers for the federal government to provide, within 21 days, a list of steps that ICE will take to ensure its future enforcement actions are lawful, including that agents are trained on appropriate policies and procedures. The judge also asked the federal government lawyers to propose remedies for the concerns he raised about false testimony and falsified records.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said the matter would be litigated in court, and provided no other comment on the case. The two men who were arrested have since been released.
The judge's ruling was issued earlier this week, ahead of a chaotic arrest in Marble Hill on Thursday, when a man being taken into custody by ICE agents was shot. The arrests in May came as ICE was ramping up enforcement in New York City and across the country, largely targeting immigrants without criminal records. The ruling also comes as ICE tactics have come under scrutiny across the country, in a flood of civil lawsuits and criminal investigations.
Judges have found in thousands of cases that ICE has improperly arrested individuals. In some instances, judges have ruled more broadly against the agency’s warrantless arrests and arrests in immigration courthouses, both key features of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.
Brown’s ruling came in response to an emergency petition filed by one of the men — Angel Jesus Almonte, a Dominican immigrant — who was arrested on May 6 in the Bronx's Norwood neighborhood. Shortly after his arrest, the same ICE officers arrested Jeury Concepcion, a U.S. citizen. Both men were tackled to the ground, according to video and court records, and Concepcion sustained head injuries requiring stitches, the ruling said.
The operation began when a team of at least five ICE officers in three unmarked vehicles arrived in the afternoon at a residential building on Hull Avenue, three of the officers later testified in a court hearing. They were looking for two men, one of whom had a removal order issued against him and motor vehicle misdemeanor charges and another who had no criminal history but had failed to appear at an immigration office.
Instead, the officers detained Almonte, who resided at the building, and Concepcion, who was arrested on the same block minutes later.
ICE later told the court that both arrests were cases of mistaken identity, an explanation that Brown rejected. Internal ICE records show the man that officers said they confused Almonte with was 5 inches shorter and 80 pounds lighter. Under cross-examination, the team leader, John Katepodis, conceded that comparing photos of the two men made it "very easy to see they're two different people."
Brown wrote that there’s an “inglorious history” to ICE agents justifying arrests because they misidentified their target. He quoted one of his earlier rulings, saying, “This rationale has become so commonplace in cases involving ICE enforcement efforts that such testimony must be examined carefully.”
The three officers also testified that they had watched Almonte make about eight hand-to-hand drug sales — claims that Brown said bore “all the hallmarks of coordinated fabrication." No drugs, paraphernalia or cash were found on Almonte, ICE's arrest report never mentioned drug activity, and government lawyers had told the court before the hearing that they had no information linking him to narcotics.
The judge also found that ICE produced a false arrest warrant after the fact. The warrant claimed that biometric data and federal database checks confirmed Almonte lacked legal status. But the supervisor who signed it acknowledged in a sworn statement that all five database searches had come back negative. After the warrant was signed and Almonte was processed, another ICE officer then re-entered Almonte’s information into its systems and searched again, this time getting a match, the ruling said.
"Some things simply strain the imagination," Brown wrote.
Katepodis also certified under oath that he had personally served the warrant on Almonte in the Bronx and read it to him in Spanish. He admitted at the hearing that this was false; he never had the document. After the hearing, he filed a sworn declaration that attempted to reconcile his past statements and contradicted parts of his own testimony, which the judge found unpersuasive.
“Perhaps more troubling than any individual instance of altered testimony, ICE’s team leader’s limited understanding of the agency’s procedures and legal requirements raises more questions than it answers,” Brown wrote.
The opinion also faulted the officers' training. Katepodis had worked as a deportation officer for two years with no prior law enforcement experience beyond serving as an NYPD dispatcher; the other two ICE agents who testified in court had been deportation officers for less than a year. Katepodis testified that knowing someone is undocumented is enough by itself to justify an arrest. "Plainly, this is not the case," Brown wrote.
Almonte was held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn until he was released on bail in late June.
If the government fails to adequately address the problems, Brown said he may impose sanctions, refer the matter to other authorities or use his contempt powers.
Tagged
Race And Justice Unit
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immigration and customs enforcement
Arya Sundaram
Arya is a reporter covering race and justice. Got a tip? Email: [email protected] or reach Arya on Signal at 512-650-8767.
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