RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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Two suburban cemetery workers arrested by federal immigration agents last fall are suing the federal government as a part of nationwide American Civil Liberties Union effort attempting to hold U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees accountable.
The two workers, both U.S. citizens, allege they were maced and wrongly arrested by agents last October while on the job at Concordia Cemetery in Forest Park. They filed their claims in March under the Federal Tort Claims Act, which allows people to seek financial compensation for wrongdoing by federal government employees.
Darren Eichler and Daniel Greer were working on the cemetery grounds when they noticed immigration agents trying to arrest a man standing in the Des Plaines River, which runs alongside the cemetery. From behind the cemetery's fence, Eichler, Greer and two other co-workers told the agents to leave the area and stop harassing people, according to their complaints.
Instead, agents approached them and demanded to be let into the cemetery. When they refused, agents took out bolt cutters and cut the gate's lock, according to the complaints. The agent sprayed them with mace and arrested them. Eichler started experiencing intense chest pains and struggled to breathe. He repeatedly asked to go to the hospital, but it took agents over an hour to take him to Rush Oak Park Hospital, where he was kept handcuffed. He was eventually released from the hospital without charges, according to his complaint.
Meanwhile, Greer was sprayed, shoved to the ground and his hands were zip-tied behind his back, according to his complaint. He was taken to a Department of Homeland Security facility but was never told why he was detained or offered medical help for the chemical burns on his face. He was also released without charges, but he was handed paperwork claiming he was arrested for "assaulting or resisting an officer," according to the complaint.
“As the agents escalated their attack on us, I kept thinking that they would stop and recognize their behavior was not right,” Greer said in a statement from the ACLU. “At every step, they escalated violence and treated us like dirt.”
DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The two men join 54 other individuals filing claims against the federal government. In the ACLU's statement, the organization said it was leading the effort to help "dozens of people and families who are seeking justice for the harm they experienced at the hands of federal immigration agents."
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