Disabled student hospitalized after ICE mistook him for ‘illegal alien’

The walk from his group home to Santa Maria High School is a route Erik Zepeda knows by heart. It's the walk he takes to his adult education classes, the walk he mastered on his own — a small independence that took years to build. On the morning of Oct. 21, two months shy of his 21st birthday, that walk turned into something out of a nightmare.

According to the Santa Maria Sun, Zepeda — an American citizen diagnosed with severe developmental delay and mild intellectual disability — was tackled to the ground by masked federal officers wearing vests marked "ICE" and "POLICE" outside JDX Pharmacy on South Broadway. The officers handcuffed him, placed him in a black vehicle, photographed him, asked him three questions, and then let him go.

An hour later, he was in the hospital.

A morning walk that ended in surgery

When Jaime Staine first heard that Zepeda — whom she has cared for as a "group home mom" for seven years, since he arrived at the Santa Maria residential facility at age 14 — had been injured, her first assumption was that he'd been mugged.

"He's so shy. … He's verbal but doesn't speak clearly," Staine told the Sun. "There is nothing that could have caused [ICE] to be aggressive to him, because he's not in that capacity to disrespect them. Erik's not aggressive. He's not."

Zepeda told the Sun the officers asked him three questions: his name, whether he was a citizen, and his birthday. After questioning and photographing him, they released him. He continued walking to school, he recalled, "just in shock." Teachers and classmates rushed to him when he arrived, and a district administrator called an ambulance, according to Santa Maria Joint Union High School District spokesperson Kenny Klein.

At the hospital, doctors found his wrist was broken in three places. He underwent surgery.

"I just imagined how scared he must have felt, because it takes a lot for him to even ask for help," Staine said.

ICE's account — and the questions it leaves unanswered

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has acknowledged the encounter, telling the Sun that officers "believed" Zepeda matched the description of a "criminal illegal alien target." But the agency's explanation has done little to settle concerns in Santa Maria.

An ICE spokesperson claimed by email that Zepeda "resisted officers, refused lawful commands, and assumed a fighting stance with clenched fists," and that officers "relied on their training to safely control the situation until they could confirm his identity." The spokesperson went further, calling claims that the individual suffered broken bones "FALSE" and asserting Zepeda "never requested medical assistance" — statements that sit uneasily beside hospital records of a surgically repaired wrist.

The agency did not respond when the Sun asked what measures officers took to ensure Zepeda, given his disabilities, understood their commands before allegedly tackling him. It also did not respond to questions about how officers determined he "matched" the target's description, or requests for a photo of that target.

The silence has fueled fears of racial profiling in a community where Latino residents make up the majority of the population — fears that were given voice by U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara), who condemned the incident in an Oct. 23 statement.

"This is outrageous, and we should not tolerate these tactics," Carbajal said.

More than a broken wrist

For the people who know Zepeda best, the deepest injuries aren't visible on an X-ray.

"He looks so lost. He doesn't look like himself. … It's really taking a mental toll on him. It's heartbreaking for all of us to see him like this," Staine said. Zepeda's family, she explained, is largely the staff and fellow residents of his group home. "He doesn't have anyone else other than … a few friends that FaceTime sometimes with him."

The physical toll is mounting too. With his wrist mending, Zepeda has lost the ability to bathe and dress himself without staff help — milestones he had earned through years of effort, along with walking to school independently.

"He worked really, really hard to get to this point in his life where he's doing all these things," Staine said. "This just diminishes everything that he's worked for."

What this means for Santa Maria

The incident lands hard in a city where immigration enforcement has long cast a shadow over daily life, and where many residents have family members with mixed immigration statuses. If a U.S. citizen with visible disabilities can be tackled on his way to school, neighbors are asking, who exactly is safe?

It also raises questions about how federal officers operate in a town like Santa Maria — whether descriptions of "targets" are treated with adequate care, and whether officers are trained to recognize and accommodate people with intellectual and developmental disabilities during encounters that can turn violent in seconds.

For now, Zepeda is healing. His wrist will mend. Whether his sense of safety — and the independence he fought so hard to build — can be restored is a question ICE has not answered, and one that this community won't soon forget.

This story is based on reporting by the Santa Maria Sun. Read the [original article](https://www.santamariasun.com/news-2/disabled-student-hospitalized-after-ice-mistook-him-for-illegal-alien/) for the Sun's full coverage.