A federal judge in New York said ICE agents falsified official records and gave false or misleading testimony after illegally arresting a man they claimed to have mistaken for someone else, finding that the evidence did not support the agency’s account of what happened. Brown said Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested Angel Jesus Almonte during a May operation in the Bronx despite striking physical differences between Almonte and the man agents said they were seeking. Brown found that the subsequent arrest paperwork contained false information and that officers later gave inconsistent, false or misleading testimony in court.
He found Almonte's arrest and detention illegal and provisionally granted his habeas petition. The same operation also resulted in the arrest of Jeury Concepcion, a U.S. citizen whom agents said they had mistaken for Dario Santos-Amarante. Those actions “included significant injury to a U.S. citizen,” the judge wrote.
Newsweek has contacted the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and Almonte's legal team for comment. Brown, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Donald Trump, has ordered the government to explain within 21 days how it will address the problems identified by the court. The ruling provides an unusually detailed account of an ICE enforcement operation on a Bronx street and the agents’ subsequent efforts to justify their conduct, raising questions about the agency’s training and procedures.
Brown said he could consider sanctions, referrals to other authorities or contempt proceedings after reviewing the government’s response. On May 6, ICE agents conducting an operation in the Bronx arrested Almonte after claiming they mistook him for one of their targets. But ICE’s own records showed substantial differences between the two men.
Almonte was listed as 6 feet tall and 180 pounds, while Santos-Amarante, the man agents said they believed he was, was listed as 5-foot-7 and 110 pounds. Under cross-examination, the ICE team leader acknowledged that photographs made it “very easy to see they’re two different people.” The judge also focused on the relative inexperience of the officers involved. Team leader Katepodis had worked as a deportation officer for two years and had no previous law enforcement background beyond serving as an NYPD dispatcher, which the court noted is a civilian position.
Kevin Brodowsky, assigned to ICE’s Fugitive Operations Unit, had been an ICE deportation officer since September 2025 after less than two years as a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officer. Yassin, also assigned to the fugitive unit, had been a deportation officer for eight months after several years with CBP. The officers began surveillance outside Almonte’s Bronx apartment building at about 3 p.m., initially looking for Dario Santos-Amarante, who was wanted in connection with a removal order.
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