{"id":133018,"date":"2026-01-14T09:30:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T09:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/133018\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T09:30:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T09:30:13","slug":"los-angeles-dad-released-after-200-days-in-federal-custody-over-paperwork-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/133018\/","title":{"rendered":"Los Angeles dad released after 200 days in federal custody over paperwork issues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/pfpj38r2d865u87c.jpg\" alt=\"Dad released after 200 days in ICE custody\" class=\"sr-only\" data-v-4292be72=\"\"\/>  <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxla.com\/video\/fmc-ppjs4u38likwxvwh\" data-v-4292be72=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Dad released after 200 days in ICE custody<\/a> <\/p>\n<p data-v-4292be72=\"\">Juan Carlos Mejia, a Winnetka dad, is back home after spending about 200 days in federal detention center. He was detained after he was accused of not having proper paperwork to live in the United States. A beloved gardener, the community raised money via a GoFundMe to allow Mejia&#8217;s wife and the couple&#8217;s kids to be able to keep paying their bills while dad was in federal custody.<\/p>\n<p data-v-6c8e215c=\"\">LOS ANGELES &#8211; Juan Carlos Mej\u00eda, a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxla.com\/tag\/us\/ca\/los-angeles-county\/los-angeles\/winnetka\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Winnetka<\/a> dad, is back home after spending about 200 days in federal detention center.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p data-v-6c8e215c=\"\">Mej\u00eda was detained over the summer after ICE agents grabbed him from a Home Depot parking lot in Burbank. During his detainment, the 42-year-old Winnetka dad was moved from center to center before he arrived home on Thursday, January 8.<\/p>\n<p data-v-6c8e215c=\"\">He was detained after he was accused of not having proper paperwork to live in the United States.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p data-v-6c8e215c=\"\">A gardener, Mej\u00eda&#8217;s clients put together a GoFundMe to raise money so Mej\u00eda&#8217;s wife and the couple&#8217;s children are able to have food on the table and keep paying their bills while dad was in federal custody. Back at the house, Mej\u00eda, his family and the family&#8217;s attorney are holding out hope that the 42-year-old will one day become a U.S. citizen.<\/p>\n<p>     <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxla.com\/tag\/us\/ca\/los-angeles-county\/los-angeles\/winnetka\" class=\"tags-tag\" data-v-6c8e215c=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Winnetka<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxla.com\/tag\/immigration\" class=\"tags-tag\" data-v-6c8e215c=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Immigration<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxla.com\/tag\/us\/ca\/los-angeles-county\/los-angeles\" class=\"tags-tag\" data-v-6c8e215c=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Los Angeles<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dad released after 200 days in ICE custody Juan Carlos Mejia, a Winnetka dad, is back home after&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133019,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[1184,14,48,52,51,47,137,50,49,100,1181,25208],"class_list":["post-133018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-ca","tag-immigration","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-county","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-news","tag-us","tag-winnetka"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133018\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}