Bodycam video shows how Palatine police officer assisted immigration agents with arrest

Palatine officials have released video from a police officer’s body-worn camera that shows him assisting federal immigration agents with an arrest late last month.

The arrest, and the officer’s involvement, led some residents to call for Palatine leaders to ban immigration agents from using village property and resources.

Village Manager Reid Ottesen told a packed crowd at Monday’s village board meeting there are no plans to enact such policies because they are merely cosmetic and unenforceable.

The village also defended the officer’s actions, saying the unidentified officer “made a split-second decision to assist in stabilizing the situation.”

Under the state’s TRUST Act, officers are prohibited from assisting federal agents in civil immigration enforcement operations. They can intervene if they believe there is a safety risk.

In the five-minute video obtained through a public records request, the officer arrives at the strip mall parking lot on the 1100 block of East Dundee Road just before noon on Monday, Oct. 27. An agitated crowd of roughly 20 people have surrounded three masked immigration agents — one woman and two men — who have detained a man and are holding him on the ground.

The officer asks the agents if they are with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The female agent says they are and shouts at him to “tell them to back up.”

The officer asks the crowd in English and Spanish to back up and “let them do their job.”

Seconds later, the officer leans into the scrum and says to the agents, “I got this hand, you get the other one.” Then, he grabs the arrestee’s right arm. In the heavily edited video released by police, there is no recording of agents asking the officer for assistance.

The man the agents are arresting is face down on the pavement, his right wrist already handcuffed in the video. The female agent is kneeling on his back, while she and another agent attempt to pull the arrestee’s left arm from underneath him.

The Palatine officer next says to the agents, “let me get this hand,” and then grabs the arrestee’s left arm and pulls it behind the man’s back while agents secure the man’s wrist with handcuffs.

The man’s left elbow is scraped and bloody in the video.

Once secured, the arrestee is put in the back of an SUV and the police officer asks the agents for official identification and writes down their names and badge numbers. He then asks for information on the man they have arrested as well.

Following the arrest last month, police officials said the department “remains committed to complying with all state laws.”

Officials added the “department is here to serve and protect all members of our community equally. Residents should feel safe reporting crimes without fear of immigration repercussions.”

Palatine Police Chief William Nord also defended the officer’s actions before the village board recently, citing the officer’s intervention necessary to avoid additional “negligent tactics” deployed by the federal agents during the arrest.