An off-duty Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer was charged with attacking a protester at a gas station in west suburban Brookfield last month, according to officials and the alleged victim.
Robert Held, 68, said he followed ICE Officer Adam Saracco from the parking lot of the suburban Broadview ICE facility and filmed him as he stopped for gas. Held stated he was standing on the sidewalk when the ICE officer approached him.
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“He increased his pace, and he came upon me, and he threw me to the ground, and he tried to take my phone,” Held recounted during the interview. “What came out of my mouth was, ‘Calm down, you need to deescalate.'” Hold stated that people around began honking their automobile horns, and Saracco eventually let him go.
According to Brookfield police and the office of Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke, the officer was charged with a misdemeanor count of battery for the attack on December 27 at a petrol station in the 9200 block of East 31st Street.
The government’s attorney “reviewed the case and declined to file felony charges, advising it was more appropriately charged as a misdemeanor.” According to the state’s attorney’s office, the police department filed the charges immediately after prosecutors recommended the misdemeanor charge following their review of the evidence.
Held stated that police initially informed him that the matter was being investigated as a felony because he was over the age of 60 and the incident occurred on a public walkway. Prosecutors often prosecute felony battery in conjunction with another crime, as he later learned.
However, Held was ultimately relieved to see charges filed. “I’m pleased that there’s going to be accountability and that justice will be done,” the politician stated.
Held has attended protests in Chicago against President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation program, and he constantly posts about it on social media. Last fall, he was caught while protesting at Broadview and confined inside for eight hours.
Officials refused to disclose specifics about the alleged attack in Brookfield or confirm that Saracco works for ICE. His first court appearance was scheduled for early March.
The United States Department of Homeland Security did not immediately reply to a request for comment. Saracco could not be reached immediately.
An ICE official named Adam Saracco has been named in several lawsuits filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, all of which have been dismissed.
In one lawsuit, filed in late 2016, an immigrant of African heritage alleged Saracco and other ICE personnel had attacked him earlier that year at the Chicago ICE offices.
The individual, James Chesire, claimed that the ICE agents’ “demeaning, violent, and unprovoked attack included physical assault, verbal assault, and excessive use of force, causing Mr. Chesire physical harm and violating an inviolable constitutional trust.”
“During this attack, several officers violently beat Mr. Chesire, at times while using derogatory racial slurs against him, with the goal of forcing him to endorse documents of unknown content and of punishing him for not signing them without understanding their contents,” the complaint alleged.
After Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer earlier this month in Minneapolis, O’Neill Burke’s office stated that ICE operations “have resulted in unnecessary deaths, broken relationships between law enforcement and our citizens, and an untold amount of terror unleashed on communities.”
Nonetheless, the office stated that it “does not conduct independent investigations into criminal conduct” and has no authority “over federal agencies or facilities. “Instead, it considers “evidence appropriately collected by law enforcement” when making charging determinations.
An off-duty Customs and Border Patrol officer was accused last month in federal court of allegations of “gunpoint sexual assaults” against four women in the suburbs in 2022. Officer Luis Uribe was ordered detained in jail pending trial.
Last year, ICE and CBP conducted a months-long immigration enforcement campaign in the Chicago area known as Operation Midway Blitz, which resulted in thousands of arrests and sparked massive protests, lawsuits, and claims of excessive force and racial profiling.
Since then, federal immigration enforcement authorities have faced similar claims as they target Minneapolis and other communities.
