A 64-year-old Colombian man was taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents earlier this week while stopping for coffee at a McDonald’s in Tacoma, Washington. Zoilo Viloria had been on his way to his maintenance job at a local building, accompanied by a coworker, when the encounter took place.
According to his daughter, Stephany Viloria, her father had lived in the United States legally for eight years, holding both a valid work permit and a driver’s license, along with a pending asylum application. She said he had no criminal record and not even a traffic violation on file.
In an interview with CNN, Stephany described how ICE agents, speaking Spanish, asked her father about his immigration status during the stop. Nervous but cooperative, he answered every question and handed over all of his documents—only to be detained on the spot.
“My dad is not a criminal. He hasn’t committed any crime,” Stephany said in a video shared on social media, describing him as an extremely hardworking man who came to the country through legal channels.
The case has drawn attention amid a broader wave of ICE arrests targeting Colombian nationals across several U.S. cities since the start of the current administration’s immigration crackdown.
Read the original report at El Tiempo for more details on this developing story.
Source: Colombiano de 64 años fue capturado por ICE cuando compraba un café en McDonald's en Washington, Estados Unidos (eltiempo.com). English version produced with AI assistance.
Image: Fibonacci Blue, BY 2.0 (via Openverse).