George Retes, a 25-year-old Army veteran and father of two, had been planning his three-year-old daughter’s Minnie Mouse birthday party at the park for weeks.
He would get her an inflatable bounce house, invite the whole family and shower her with gifts and treats. She was excited for the fun party and he was excited to see the smile on her face, he said.
Those plans fell apart last week when Retes – a US citizen – was detained by federal immigration agents during an immigration raid and protest at a legal Southern California marijuana farm where he worked.
Left injured and burned from pepper spray and tear gas, Retes was detained for three days without explanation, he said. His wife, who couldn’t reach him during his detention, was scrambling to find out where her husband had been taken.
And Retes missed the party he and his toddler had been dreaming about.
Instead of seeing flickering birthday candles and hearing children’s laughter on his daughter’s birthday, the father found himself alone in a cell with bright lights that never turned off, his skin burning and limbs aching. As he laid on a thin mattress covering a cement slab, he wondered if he would ever see his family again.
“All I wanted was to be there for my daughter’s birthday … I was so excited to watch her turn three and just enjoy her day and just watch her be happy for her day,” Retes told CNN. “And it sucked not being there.”
The arrest unfolded on July 10 when federal immigration officers carried out large-scale raids at two Glass House marijuana farms in Carpinteria and Camarillo and arrested over 300 people – part of an ongoing trend of immigration enforcement at worksites like farms and construction sites that have struck fear into immigrant communities.
That day, Retes says he woke up and drove to work like he would any other day, not knowing there was unrest at his workplace. When he arrived at Glass House Farms in Camarillo – where he works as a contract security guard – he was met with throngs of protesters, cars piled up in the middle of the road and people standing in the street.
He made his way through the crowd and was confronted by a barricade of agents blocking anyone from going into Glass House, he recounted. The Department of Homeland Security said Immigration Customs Enforcement and US Customs and Border Protection officers were executing warrants at the marijuana grow sites and were met with hundreds of protesters.
He got out of his car and walked up to the agents to let them know he’s an American citizen who’s just trying to get to work.
“I didn’t think it was gonna be a problem for me to go to work … as long as I identified myself and let them know what I was trying to do,” he said.
The agents refused to listen to him, Retes said, so he returned to his car.
That’s when he says the situation escalated: The agents surrounded his car and started yelling conflicting orders to get out of his car, reverse and park his car, according to the father. Retes then reversed, trying to leave the tense scene, he said.
Agents continued yelling, banged on his window and pulled on his door trying to get it open, he said. The uniformed federal agents eventually threw what appeared to be tear gas into the crowd of protesters, which blurred Retes’ vision and made him choke.
“I’m trying to leave. I’m trying to get out of here,” Retes said he told the agents in between gasping breaths.
At that moment, one agent shattered his driver’s side window, and another sprayed pepper spray in his face, Retes said, recalling feeling a piece of glass from the window cut his leg. Then, they dragged him out of the car and threw him on the ground, pinning him down, he said.
“I had one agent kneeling on my back and another one kneeling on my neck,” said Retes, who noted he had neck and back injuries from his four-year Army service.
Retes recalled telling officers he couldn’t breathe because of the pepper spray and tear gas. But he said they proceeded to put him in handcuffs and dragged him away without explaining what he was arrested for. The Department of Homeland Security would later accuse Retes of assault – an allegation he vehemently denies.
“I just had no clue what was gonna happen to me,” Retes said.
Retes became one of a number of US citizens and legal permanent residents detained or arrested in the tense raids amid the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown – with some arrested without explanation and with no way to contact their families, immigrant advocacy groups say.
Shows of force and clashes between immigration officers and protesters at raid sites have become periodical occurrences in the Los Angeles area as more people oppose the federal government’s immigration enforcement actions.
An EMT wrapped Retes’ leg wound in gauze before the father was escorted into an unmarked SUV and taken to an empty field, where there were federal agents from several agencies, Retes said.
Agents took his fingerprints and photos. And when Retes asked why he was detained, the agents wouldn’t answer him, he recounted.
“They never told me anything … I sat there for hours asking them why I was here, why I’m being arrested, and no one could give me an answer,” Retes said. “No one even knew who arrested me or why they arrested me. No one knew what was going to happen to me or who I was even going to go with.”
Retes was eventually driven to downtown Los Angeles’ Metropolitan Detention Center, where he was held by the US Marshals Service, online records show.
He was booked, given prison clothes and placed in a holding cell with a professor who was detained during immigration protests that same day, Retes said.
On Friday morning, Retes filled out his intake form and answered questions from the medical staff about his childhood, past and his life now. Based on his answers, they determined he should be put on suicide watch, where he remained alone in a cell with bright lights that never turned off, according to Retes. Guards were always outside his cell and a psychiatrist checked on him once a day to ensure he wouldn’t harm himself, he said.
In the cell for days, Retes was never told why he was arrested or if he was charged with any crimes, he said.
Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, told CNN in a statement on Sunday that Retes had not been charged. The US Attorney’s Office told CNN Friday it would not be pressing charges against Retes.
McLaughlin later said Retes was detained for alleged assault, but did not provide details on the accusation.
“As CBP and ICE agents were executing criminal search warrants on July 10 at the marijuana facility in Camarillo, CA, George Retes—a U.S. citizen—became violent and refused to comply with law enforcement,” McLaughlin said Thursday. “He challenged agents and blocked their route by refusing to move his vehicle out of the road.”
Retes denies the agency’s allegations.
“I would like to see where I assaulted an officer, and if that’s true, why wasn’t I charged?” he said. “They could lie all they want. That’s not what happened.”
CNN has reached out to the US Marshals and US Customs and Border Protection for comment.
Glass House said last week it received immigration and naturalization warrants on the day of the raids.
“As per the law, we verified that the warrants were valid and we complied. Workers were detained and we are assisting to provide them legal representation,” Glass House said in a statement.
Retes described his detention as “depressing, very confusing” and said he was “so lost” for those three long days. In pain from his injured leg and burning skin, all he could think of as he was stuck alone in the cell was that he would miss his daughter’s third birthday.
“I was there with my thoughts the entire time, wondering if I was ever going to get out, if anyone ever even knew my story or what had happened to me,” he said. “I just thought I was never gonna see my kids again.”
Though tear gas and pepper spray burned his eyes and skin, he was never given a chance to shower, he said. With an intense burning pain in his arms and legs, it was impossible for Retes to sleep on what he described as a cement block with a thin mattress and thin blanket, he said.
And he never received medical care for the gash on his leg, even after he pleaded for it, Retes said.
During his detention, Retes wasn’t able to speak with an attorney or call his wife to let her know where he was, he said, adding that no one else called to let his loved ones know where he was.
“They didn’t give them any information about where I was at,” he said. “Any agency they called they were just giving them the runaround.”
Meanwhile, his wife was calling anybody she could to find out where her husband was taken and speaking with local news stations through tears.
“I just don’t know where he’s at. I’ve been up since 6 a.m. trying to call the sheriff’s, the police department, Oxnard, Camarillo, Ventura… They say they don’t know,” his wife Guadalupe Torres told CNN affiliate KABC on Friday.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which runs the Metropolitan Detention Center, declined to comment Friday on the conditions of Retes’ confinement, citing privacy and security reasons, but told CNN in a statement that “all individuals in BOP custody, regardless of housing assignment, are continually encouraged to maintain contact with loved ones, friends, and outside resources.”
“Each individual is independently treated on a case-by-case basis, and treatment is provided as clinically indicated, including referrals to specialists,” the statement read, in part.
Finally, on Sunday, Retes was told he would be released and was walked downstairs, where he signed for his belongings and was told he was free to leave, the father recalled.
“So I basically was locked up for no reason, and missed my daughter’s birthday for no reason?” Retes said he asked the guards. He says he was met with silence.
Once he was outside, Retes was happy to feel the fresh air and the sun against his skin, he said. His wife picked him up and the couple headed to his parents’ house to see their young daughter and eight-year-old son.
“I felt relieved to see a familiar face, and just at that moment when I saw her, I knew it was real that I was finally out,” Retes said of reuniting with his wife.
Once they arrived at the house, the first thing Retes did was run up to his kids and hug them. They ran into his arms screaming “Dad,” he said.
“It was the best thing ever, that feeling I’ll never forget. It was so nice to finally … hold them,” Retes said.
“They were just really happy that I was out and that I was okay … it kind of just eased all their minds,” Retes said of his wife and children. “We’re just kind of trying to take it one day at a time.”
But Retes – who said he joined the Army when he was 18 and was deployed in Iraq in 2019 – said he and his family are still in distress about the events of July 10.
“No one deserves to be treated the way I did,” he said. “It shouldn’t even matter if I’m a veteran, it shouldn’t matter if I’m a US citizen or the color of my skin, or if I’m here illegally or I’m an immigrant.”
Retes said he apologized to his daughter for missing her birthday. Because she’s so young, he was unable to explain to her why he was gone, he said.
“It’s just something that I’m gonna have to live with for the rest of my life,” he said.
