ICE detains 5-year-old boy coming home from Minnesota preschool

He was arriving home from preschool with his dad. The photos show what Minnesota school officials say happened next.

They said a five-year-old boy, wearing a blue tuque with droopy ears and carrying a Spider-Man backpack, was apprehended by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in the driveway of his Columbia Heights, Minn., home on Tuesday.

Liam Conejo Ramos was essentially used "as bait" as federal officers pursued his father, said Zena Stenvik, the superintendent with Columbia Heights Public Schools.

"Another adult living in the home was outside and begged the agents to let them take care of the small child, but was refused," Stenvik said in a statement Thursday.

"Instead, the agent took the child out of the still-running vehicle, led him to the door, and directed him to knock on the door, asking to be let in, in order to see if anyone else was home — essentially using a five-year-old as bait."

Liam and his father are now being held at the Dilley Immigration Processing Centre in Dilley, Texas, the family’s lawyer Marc Prokosch told CBC News on Thursday. He said he could not know for sure whether father and son were being held together.

Prokosch said detaining children and families seeking asylum is "inhumane and unacceptable."

Columbia Heights is a suburb of Minneapolis, where a massive immigration crackdown has seen thousands of officers sent into the Twin Cities region. It's become a powder keg of protests and aggression ever since an ICE shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good, a mother of three, on Jan. 7.

Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin told CBC News in a written statement that ICE didn't target the five-year-old, but was instead conducting a "targeted operation" to arrest his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, who she described as an "illegal alien from Ecuador."

“ICE did NOT target a child," McLaughlin said.

"As agents approached the driver Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, fled on foot — abandoning his child. For the child's safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended Conejo Arias."

She added that parents are asked if they want to be removed with their children, "or ICE will place the children with a safe person the parent designates."

In a visit to Minnesota on Thursday, U.S. Vice-President JD Vance echoed McLaughlin in saying ICE agents took the child into custody because his father left him behind.

"I see this story — and I'm a father of a five-year-old, actually, a five-year-old little boy — and I think, 'Oh my God, this is terrible. How did we arrest a five year old?' I did follow-up research. What I find is the five-year-old was not arrested. His dad was an illegal alien and when they went to arrest his illegal father, the father ran," Vance said during a news conference.

"So the story is that ICE detained a five-year-old. What are they supposed to do? Let a five-year-old child freeze to death?"

McLaughlin's statement did not say what happened to Liam after the arrest or where he is now. The Department of Homeland Security has yet to respond to CBC's requests for that information.

'Why detain a 5-year-old?'

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz criticized the child's reported detainment.

In an online post, the governor said the Trump administration's "campaign of retribution has got to stop."

"Minnesotans want safety. They want freedom. They want what’s best for our kids. Masked agents snatching preschoolers off the street and sending them to Texas detention centers serves none of those purposes," he wrote.

The photos of Liam, which were provided to CBC News by Columbia Heights Public Schools, were taken by "known and confirmed community members who were on site," school officials said.

Twenty minutes after Liam and his father were taken, an older son in middle school arrived home "to a missing dad, a missing little brother and a terrified mother," said Stenvik.

"Why detain a five-year-old? You cannot tell me that this child is going to be classified as a violent criminal," she said.

Prokosch said Adrian Conejo Ramos and his son entered the United States lawfully through the border crossing in Brownsville, Texas. He said Adrian, who is from Ecuador, had an asylum claim and no criminal record in Minnesota.

WATCH | School board chair speaks about preschooler's detainment:

Schools 'must be safe places' for families to thrive, board chair says after ICE detains child

January 22|

Duration 1:14

At a news conference Thursday afternoon alongside the lawyer for Liam Conejo Ramos, the five-year-old detained by ICE in a Minneapolis suburb, school board chair Mary Granlund got emotional speaking about the anxiety she says she has seen in schools since immigration agents arrived in the area.

School officials said Liam was the fourth student from their district to be apprehended by ICE agents in recent weeks.

On Tuesday, a 17-year-old high school student was taken by armed and masked agents while on their way to school, with no parents present, Stenvik said. Two weeks ago, a 10-year-old and her mother were arrested on their way to school, she added.

"By the end of the school day, they were already in a detention centre in Texas, and they are still there," Stenvik said.

She said another 17-year-old student in the district was detained last week.

The statement from Homeland Security doesn't mention any other children. CBC News has requested information about them, but has not yet received a response.