A South Los Angeles woman accused of staging a hoax kidnapping by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in order to gain public sympathy and solicit donations is expected to plead guilty Monday to a federal charge.
Yuriana Julia Pelaez Calderon, 42, has agreed to enter a plea in Los Angeles federal court to a single count of conspiracy.
The woman’s attorney told assembled media in June 2025 that Calderon had been kidnapped days earlier at a Jack in the Box restaurant parking lot in downtown Los Angeles and brought to San Ysidro, where she was presented to an ICE staffer and handed voluntary self-deportation paperwork.
The attorney said Calderon refused to sign the paperwork and demanded to speak to a judge and a lawyer. In response, the lawyer said, “she was punished” by federal agents and sent to a warehouse in an undisclosed location where she was abused.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the news conference garnered media attention and stoked fear in the community. Meanwhile, Calderon’s daughter set up a GoFundMe page, requesting $4,500 and stating that Calderon “was taken by masked men in an unmarked vehicle … when she was on her way to work.”
The entire story was false and designed to generate sympathy and solicit donations, court papers show.
The Department of Homeland Security released a statement saying the hoax was created to malign the administration’s immigration enforcement efforts. DHS described Calderon as a Mexican national living in the U.S. illegally.
“Yuriana Julia Pelaez Calderon was never arrested or kidnapped by ICE or bounty hunters — this criminal illegal alien scammed innocent Americans for money and diverted limited DHS resources from removing the worst of the worst from Los Angeles communities,” a DHS official said after the press conference. “Politicians and activist media peddled these smears that were designed to demonize law enforcement and evade accountability. Calderon will now face justice and the media and politicians who swallowed and pushed this garbage should be embarrassed.”
Calderon’s attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.
On July 3, 2025, when Calderon was still purportedly missing, federal agents “grew concerned” after confirming that Calderon was not in immigration custody, prosecutors said, and DHS personnel began searching for the woman over the July 4 holiday weekend.
Two days later, agents tracked Calderon down in a shopping plaza parking lot in Bakersfield. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Mexican national and self-described activist continued to falsely claim she was taken by masked men and held in custody with others.
Prosecutors said video surveillance — including images of Calderon leaving the Jack in the Box parking lot and getting into a nearby sedan — as well as telephone records, bolstered suspicions that Calderon fabricated the entire story.
“Calderon and her family knew that law enforcement was searching for her and feared for her safety, but Calderon and her family did not come forward,” according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Instead, Calderon created what law enforcement described as fabricated photos of her “rescue,” made to look as if she was abused while in federal immigration custody and planned to hold a press conference on July 6, 2025, to increase donations to the GoFundMe page and to obtain other benefits, prosecutors said.
“Dangerous rhetoric that ICE agents are `kidnapping’ illegal immigrants is being recklessly peddled by politicians and echoed in the media to inflame the public and discredit our courageous federal agents,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli of the Central District of California said in a statement at the time.
“The conduct alleged in (the) complaint shows this hoax `kidnapping’ was a well-orchestrated conspiracy,” he continued. “The defendant and all those involved will face the full consequences of their conduct under federal law. I thank our partners at Homeland Security Investigations and all federal agents facing unprecedented levels of assaults for once again providing cool heads and professionalism during these difficult times.”
If her plea is accepted, Calderon could face up to five years in federal prison at sentencing, prosecutors said.
A co-defendant, Yvette Estrada, pleaded guilty to a federal charge and is expected to be sentenced Nov. 30.