ICE arresting people at Hauppauge immigration case check-ins, lawyer, activists say

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were targeting people applying for legal immigration status Wednesday at a Hauppauge federal building, according to a lawyer, a legal assistant, activists and a friend of those arrested.

In separate incidents on Wednesday morning, ICE arrested two men moments after they left the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' Application Support Center on Wheeler Road, a lawyer, a legal assistant and a friend said.

The USCIS processes applications of people pursuing immigration, naturalization, green cards and citizenship, while ICE — also housed under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security — enforces federal immigration law.

The two men were applicants in an immigration process that can take years.

At around 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, a 30-year-old man, later identified by his legal assistant as Jose Jampiery Morejon Moreta, left the USCIS building after his appointment and walked toward his car, where activists warned him that federal agents were circling the area, according to a witness who asked for anonymity due to concerns about being targeted by ICE. Minutes later, ICE pulled over Morejon Moreta and arrested him on the shoulder of the Long Island Expressway, his friend told Newsday.

Morejon Moreta is a journalist from Ecuador who received death threats from a terrorist group that targets journalists during the pandemic and entered the United States legally in 2021, filing for asylum in September, said Eliana Betancourt Mendez, a legal assistant with Inmigración Aldía IAD.

Activist Barbara McGlone, 62, of Brentwood, was driving around the area Wednesday morning after hearing about ICE activity when she noticed a white SUV on the shoulder of the LIE.

"I spotted the car. I saw the lights on. I realized it’s still running," she said.

McGlone babysat Morejon Moreta's car for about five hours, waiting for someone to come pick it up.

"This makes me sick," she said through tears. "I actually can’t sleep at night sometimes."

At about 3 p.m., a friend of the man hopped out of an Uber to pick up the car. The woman said Morejon Moreta called her after being arrested Wednesday morning, and sent his GPS coordinates via WhatsApp. Newsday is not naming the friend due to concerns about being targeted by ICE.

"This is completely wrong," said Suffolk Legis. Samuel Gonzalez (D-Brentwood), who was at the federal building Wednesday. "People are going over there to get their fingerprints because it’s a process that they’re doing to get their legal papers."

USCIS referred questions about the arrests to ICE, but the agency did not respond. USCIS did not respond to questions about whether those seeking legal status should continue coming into their check-in appointments.

Newsday observed several people pull into the USCIS Application Support Center parking lot for their appointments Wednesday.

Anthony Ferrara, 32, who runs a life insurance business overlooking the neighboring parking lot, said he’s seen unmarked law enforcement cars stake out the area for about a month.

One car waits in the neighboring lot, while a second idles on the street, he said.

Michael David Nappo, a Riverhead immigration attorney, said one of his clients had been arrested there earlier in the week and, Wednesday, another client, a father of two, was also arrested outside the federal building.

"He walked in, he got fingerprinted, and as he walked out, they put him in handcuffs," Nappo told Newsday.

The day before, the two men had spoken about the client's Wednesday appointment, according to Nappo.

"He was a little scared," Nappo said. "But I reassured him that he has a pending case, he’s married to a U.S. citizen. He’s doing what he’s supposed to be doing. ... He has no criminal record."

"He’s been here for 10 years, he’s paid his taxes for 10 years," Nappo said of his client, who has a 5-year-old daughter and 11-year-old son. "It’s sad, the day before Thanksgiving, that they would do this."

The Trump administration is waging what it has promised to be the largest deportation campaign in U.S. history, and activists on Long Island are taking a more active role warning people who are in the country illegally of imminent ICE activity in public.

Since June, these groups reported 246 sightings of ICE agents in Nassau and Suffolk, according to Islip Forward, which tracks such occurrences.