‘This fight isn’t over’: Baldwin Park 3 latest in being criminalized for protesting ICE agents

On Feb. 27, Cynthia Raygoza, Ashleigh Brown and Sandra Samane were found innocent of conspiracy to dox an ICE agent after being criminalized by the federal government for following an immigration officer to his house while livestreaming on Instagram account of ICE Out of LA.

The women, called the Baldwin Park 3 by supporters, said the United States Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) were trying to make an example of them.

During a week-long trial during the last week of February, federal prosecutors alleged that the women had intentionally followed an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer to his home in Baldwin Park after leaving downtown Los Angeles in an ICE van and that the women planned to share his address with others. However, during the trial, Raygoza’s lawyer, Gregory Nicolaysen, established the women did not know they were following the agent to his home and that they believed they were following him to an ICE raid, and did so while livestreaming, which is a standard tactic while observing ICE.

When the women arrived at the Baldwin Park home, they announced that an ICE agent lived on the street and encouraged other people on the livestream to join in a protest — however, they never said the address, just the name of the street. They felt they needed to let his neighbors know that an ICE agent lived on their street, in case anyone was undocumented. Nicolaysen said the ICE agent was confrontational, aggressive and moved his car behind the women’s car so they could not leave, leading to them being arrested by the Baldwin Park Police Department.

The ICE agent, Rogelio Reyes Huitzilin, alleged that Raygoza pushed him, but that was later proved false in court. 

While the women were proven innocent of the charge of conspiracy to dox an ICE agent because of the livestream — which Nicolaysen said is what the case was primarily about — two of them were convicted of stalking. Nicolaysen challenged this, saying the event only took place over an hour and a half on a single day, while stalking is repeated behavior over a period of time.

Nicolaysen said that he and the attorney for the other defendant are seeking to overturn the stalking charge for both, while Samane was found innocent of all charges.

“When we think of stalking, we think of repetition, we think of persistence,” Nicolaysen said. “We think of somebody who doesn't know when to quit. But here, this was a one time event that happened on a single day, within an hour and a half. So we are dealing with an unprecedented application of the federal stalking statute to the actions of ICE protesters.”

He also said that people need to be concerned that the government might feel emboldened to pursue similar charges against activists and everyday observers who follow agents to a raid or live stream their activity.

“Now the government might shift gears and treat the protest activity as stalking, because the government now thinks they have a lot of flexibility under the stalking statute,” he said.

Kuali Aleman, former director of ICE Out of LA, had been organizing with the women since last summer when raids began in Los Angeles. She said that the women were part of the 24-hour protest outside of the Metropolitan Detention Center and also did rapid response work with the community. She said once ICE and the National Guard hit Los Angeles, the women sprang into action and formed a community.

She urged the community to keep an eye on their case, saying that the government intends to make an example out of them.

“They're trying to come down really harshly on them, so that other protesters can be discouraged and stop protecting communities that are vulnerable,” Aleman said. “They do not want protesters and rapid responders to protect the communities against ICE.”

It is not uncommon for law enforcement and the federal government to go after protestors. Aleman said that she has seen a lot of arrests and intimidation by the Los Angeles Police Department and ICE since the raids started in 2025. She said many people have gone to jail or an ICE detention center for protesting.

“Charges were being dropped all the time,” Aleman said.

Kathy Carreño, a protester with ICE Out of LA, was arrested for an alleged assault on a federal officer in August and found innocent in trial three months later. 

“The federal government is trying to intimidate us,” Carreño said. “They're very much trying to suppress our freedom of speech and our rights, they're violating them continuously. It's an intimidation tactic 100%.”

Carreño said that like the Baldwin Park 3, many protestors and rapid responders livestream, adding that it's extremely important to document. If they don’t, then it's the organizers' words against law enforcement, “which would be a lot more difficult to argue.” 

The same videos that protestors have filmed in L.A. have been used to clear people facing charges.

Additionally, Carreño said it is a waste of resources to prosecute protestors like the Baldwin Park 3 for relatively low-level cases when ICE agents and law enforcement have both injured and killed people.

“ICE and DHS are already not even being charged with murder, and they're over here violating our rights with impunity,” Carreño said. “They already act like they can be touched and that they cannot, like nothing will happen to them, that they won't be prosecuted. I definitely do think that it would embolden them even more having this verdict.”

Following Raygoza, Brown and Samane’s arrest, they lost their jobs. They launched Go Fund Me campaigns to compensate for their loss of income. 

Carreño said it is important for protestors to not get discouraged. They should remember that they have First Amendment rights, they should record from a distance and “the federal government can and will twist any little action that we take.”

“This fight isn't over, a lot of the people in the Brown community look to our ancestors who brought us here, who migrated, who are from this land and we are native, not illegal,” Aleman said. “We have roots here, and we should be proud and not let any settlers or anyone convince us that we don't belong here in our home. We need to unite together as a community.”