Two staff members from an Ontario surgery center have been charged with allegedly interfering with U.S. immigration officers trying to detain landscapers who ran into the center to escape. <\/p>\n
Jose de Jesus Ortega, a 38-year-old Highland resident, was arrested Friday morning and is expected to appear in U.S. District Court in Riverside, according to a U.S. attorney\u2019s office Central District of California news release<\/a>. <\/p>\n Officials are still looking for the other suspect, Danielle Nadine Davila, 33, of Corona. Both are charged with assaulting a federal officer and conspiracy to prevent by force and intimidation a federal officer from discharging his duties, authorities said.<\/p>\n The allegations against the pair stem from a run-in between staff at Ontario Advanced Surgery Center and agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement on July 8, when two landscapers ran inside the facility to avoid the agents and staff members were captured on video getting involved.<\/p>\n According to video obtained by KTLA-TV<\/a>, staffers told two agents to leave because they didn\u2019t have a warrant to go onto the property. The agents were trying to detain 30-year-old Denis Guillen-Solis and two other landscapers.<\/p>\n In the video, Guillen-Solis is shown holding onto the doorway at the surgical center and asking the agents to present identification. The agents then pulled Guillen-Solis from the doorway and detained him.<\/p>\n \u201cThe illegal alien arrested inside the surgery center was not a patient. He ran inside for cover and these defendants attempted to block his apprehension by assaulting our agents,\u201d said U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli in a statement.<\/p>\n The Ontario Advanced Surgery Center did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n The charges against the two staffers continue Essayli\u2019s aggressive approach to bringing charges against people who are arrested during ICE protests and operations. Essayli\u2019s office has filed felony cases against at least 38 people for alleged misconduct that either took place in the sites of immigration raids or during last month\u2019s protests, but many have been dismissed<\/a> or reduced to misdemeanor charges.<\/p>\n According to an affidavit, the two ICE agents wore government-issued equipment, including vests and were using unmarked government-operated vehicles when they conducted their operations. <\/p>\n The agents followed a truck with three men inside and approached them after the men exited the truck in the parking lot of the surgery center, according to the release. Two of the men ran away and one of them, an alleged unauthorized immigrant from Honduras, was detained near the surgery center\u2019s front entrance and tried to pull away, causing him and the ICE officer to fall to the ground.<\/p>\n A medical staffer helped the man off the ground and pulled him away from the officer, according to the news release. The man went into the surgery center and was chased by the ICE agent, who eventually stopped him.<\/p>\n