DENVER — The ACLU of Colorado filed three claims today, July 29, 2026, against the federal government on behalf of Fernando Jaramillo Solano and his two children, ages 15 and 12. The family was stopped and unlawfully arrested and then incarcerated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers on their way to school in Durango, Colorado, in October 2025. The filing is part of a coordinated nationwide effort by the ACLU and its affiliates to hold ICE accountable involving 53 claims across 17 states and Washington, D.C.
Fernando Jaramillo Solano was driving his two children to school on the morning of October 27, 2025, when he noticed an unmarked car behind him with emergency lights flashing. When Jaramillo Solano pulled over to the side of the road, he was joined by other unmarked vehicles. Armed ICE officers with masks covering their faces approached his car and ordered him to provide identification and exit the vehicle. Officers reached through a cracked window, opened the car door without his permission, and grabbed his arm. ICE officers grabbed his passport out of his hands, and Jaramillo Solano then provided additional paperwork for his pending asylum case and pending work authorization. Despite this, ICE officers handcuffed him and put him in an unmarked vehicle.
While handcuffed in the unmarked vehicle, Jaramillo Solano witnessed agents grabbing his children. He saw ICE agents push and handcuff his 15-year-old son before placing him in another vehicle. He also saw an ICE agent get into the backseat of his car and push his 12-year-old daughter to the passenger side of their vehicle where an ICE agent outside of the car pulled her out. She was placed in the same unmarked car as Jaramillo Solano. When locked in the car together, his daughter told Jaramillo Solano that the agent who pushed her also sexually assaulted her.
Jaramillo Solano and his two children were detained for approximately thirty hours in an ICE holding facility in Durango. The facility had no windows. The lights remained on the entire night. There was a single cement bed and seat the three of them shared. The only food they each received was a cold hamburger and a cold soup. Jaramillo Solano and his son were forced to use the open-air toilet in the holding cell. All the while, the officers repeatedly denigrated the family. ICE then drove Jaramillo Solano and his family to New Mexico, in violation of a previous court order. ICE transferred the family again to a Texas detention facility and began removal proceedings against them. In the face of deplorable detention conditions, Jaramillo Solano decided to return to Colombia with his family, despite the risks of returning to their country of origin.
“Our client and his two young children were unlawfully arrested and abused by ICE on their way to school, without warrants and no probable cause, all when ICE mistakenly thought our client was someone else. Even after recognizing their mistake, and knowing that our clients had pending asylum applications, ICE agents decided to arrest and jail them to meet arbitrary quotas. These actions were unjustified and illegal. ICE must be held accountable,” said Tim Macdonald, ACLU of Colorado legal director. “The Trump administration has repeatedly encouraged this type of violence in our communities as part of its unlawful and inhumane immigration enforcement. The ACLU and more than a dozen of its affiliates are fighting back against these injustices with the more than 50 legal claims filed in 17 states. We must work together to defend and protect the civil rights of everyone in Colorado and across our nation and we will not back down.”
The ACLU of Colorado’s filing alleges that ICE officers committed assault, battery, engaged in a false imprisonment, were negligent in their actions, received negligent training and supervision, and both intentionally and negligently inflicted emotional distress. It also states that Jaramillo Solano and his two children continue to experience significant mental health symptoms, including extreme anxiety, sleep disturbances, and more. The document details that Jaramillo Solano’s daughter is even afraid of wearing certain clothes in public for fear of being sexually assaulted.
Jaramillo Solano’s experience is not uncommon. Since the beginning of President Trump’s second term, federal law enforcement agents have terrorized communities and people in their custody with a blatant disregard for the law. The consequences have been deadly. Conditions in ICE facilities are so inhumane that the rate of deaths in ICE custody has more than doubled since Trump’s term began, reaching its highest level in over a decade. In early July, reporting revealed that, after the White House pushed to increase arrest rates, ICE officials detained more than 10,000 people in five days. Only days later, ICE agents in unmarked vehicles shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas while he was on his way to work. The following week, a federal agent shot and killed Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine.
Across the country, ACLU affiliates are challenging the Trump administration’s illegal conduct by filing claims under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), one of the few legal tools available to seek financial compensation for wrongdoing by federal government employees. Through this coordinated effort, ACLU affiliates are representing dozens of people and families who are seeking justice for the harm they experienced at the hands of federal immigration agents. The claims reveal a widespread pattern of civil rights violations and abuse carried out by officials nationwide, affecting people who are immigrants, U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, families, workers, and people exercising their constitutional rights.
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