UPDATED: The List of Criminal Agents in ICE and Border Patrol
[Content Warning - Sexual and State Violence]
The off-duty Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent who killed Keith Porter, Jr. has a history of racism, child abuse, and explosive tempers. Despite murdering Porter in cold blood, Brian Palacios remains free without charge and employed by ICE. In February 2025, Palacios was barred from having any contact with two of his girlfriend’s children, after they testified that he beat his own sons and frequently made homophobic and racist remarks. The order was extended in June. In a new filing, Palacios’ girlfriend’s ex-husband seeks to keep his own daughter out of the volatile home. The filing cites the ICE agent’s violence against his own children and explains, “the stress of having shot and killed another man” makes the home even less safe.
An updated list of 30 current and former ICE and Border Patrol agents who have been charged with and/or convicted of crimes shows that Palacio’s behavior is part of the organizational culture there. The men included on this list — and they are all men — have been charged with offenses like gunpoint sexual assault; child sex trafficking; aggravated assault; robbery; rape; torture; kidnapping; sexual abuse of a minor; and possession and production of child sexual abuse materials.
All but one of these criminal federal agents were charged with sex offenses (29 of 30), and two-thirds committed sexual crimes against children. The list includes John Daly III, the East Valley Serial Rapist. Daly was arrested twenty-two years after his first known offense. Arizona Border Patrol has the most agents on the list, at nine, but the Detroit Sector of ICE and CBP — with jurisdiction over Ohio and Michigan — has five individuals. Some, like Cincinnati ICE’s Andrew Golobic, used their authority as federal agents to abuse victims on the job. Others, like Cincinnati ICE’s Samuel Saxon, nearly killed a relative.
Since Saxon’s arrest, Lynn Tramonte, Executive Director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance has been pointing out that there is “a real problem with gender-based violence by ICE agents, and the agency is not taking it seriously. Andrew Golobic used his position of power against women who feared deportation to extort sex. The police have been called to Samuel Saxon’s home 22 times. Anyone familiar with the pattern of domestic violence knows strangulation is part of a pattern of escalating behavior, that often ends in murder.”
This culture of violence toward woman and children is visible in ICE agents’ officially-sanctioned actions, and the Department of Homeland Security’s unconditional support for their acts of violence. Said Tramonte, “Any woman watching the videos of Rümeysa Öztürk’s abduction and Renee Good’s murder didn’t only see violent state actions. We saw people who claim to be the ‘good guys’ using the tactics and tools of the criminals women were trained to watch out for, since childhood.”
She told American Community Media, “Women are trained to protect ourselves when we’re in public, and now ICE is using the tools of criminals to arrest people. Then if somebody resists arrest because they don’t know who they’re being kidnapped by, they get charged, they get thrown to the ground, they get shot.”
Criminals are also copying ICE, taking advantage of the fact that these federal agents hide behind masks while carrying out official duties. Reports Ms. Magazine, “Across the country, so-called ‘ICE impersonators’ are on the rise as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) itself has been violently arresting people without warrants, sometimes in plain clothes using unmarked vehicles. Nearly impossible to distinguish between real and fake agents, men have allegedly lied about their identities to intimidate, kidnap and rape women with precarious immigration statuses, according to survivors’ accounts.”
Tramonte continued: “Every day women exist in public is a day we are on guard for predators. This list of thirty ICE and Border Patrol agents who committed crimes against women and children is just the tip of the iceberg. It is simply the people who have been caught, and their actions appropriately charged as crimes, rather than sanctioned by their federal bosses. Many of these men were employed by ICE and the Border Patrol for decades, abusing people sexually and violently the entire time. Fully two-thirds of these criminal agents committed sexual crimes against children.
“There is a dangerous culture within these agencies, and that is evidenced by this horrifying list. Congress must stop giving ICE and the Border Patrol a blank check to commit crimes against the public. DHS must answer for its faulty hiring, vetting, and re-verification processes. The public cannot trust law enforcement agencies that employ so many dangerous criminals, and refuse to police their own ranks.”
Download the updated list of 30 criminal agents in ICE/Border Patrol.
