Vermont protesters and three detainees left with fallout of Dorset Street raid

On Dorset Street in South Burlington, a day that began with singing and chanting grew into an hourslong confrontation, ending with chemical agents and flash bangs used to clear a crowd. In Vermont, the operation’s human cost now centers on three people detained during the raid, even as federal authorities say the 24-year-old man they were seeking remains at large.

Rachel Elliott and Dorset Street, South Burlington, as the crowd swelled

Rachel Elliott of Migrant Justice watched the scene shift over the course of Wednesday. She said their rapid response network mobilized after hearing about the incident, and what started as mostly peaceful protest drew more people and more law enforcement officers throughout the day. “The scene on the ground was pretty hectic. More officers than I’ve seen in one place here in Vermont, ” Elliott said.

The crowd had gathered outside a single-family home on Dorset Street while federal agents looked for Deyvi Daniel Corona-Sanchez, the U. S. Attorney’s Office said. As the hours stretched on, the street became a testing ground for how far a federal arrest effort could push a community already primed to protest. By Wednesday evening, activists were surrounding the last federal vehicle still on the street. Videos later showed agents pulling demonstrators from the ground and thrusting them aside before the car drove away.

Local and state law enforcement described their own pressure in the confrontation. Police said they were pushed and spat on by people in the crowd. Vermont State Police said they acted with restraint despite being pushed, spit on, and pelted with water bottles and clods of mud, while video captured instances of local police throwing protesters to the ground.

Deyvi Daniel Corona-Sanchez remains at large after the South Burlington operation

Federal authorities said the target of the operation, Corona-Sanchez, was not inside the Dorset Street home when agents entered. The U. S. Attorney for the District of Vermont revealed the next morning that the man Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were pursuing had not been taken into custody. Federal authorities said Corona-Sanchez was wanted on a criminal charge of illegally entering the United States after having been previously deported, and said he remains at large.

The search followed an earlier sequence that agents tied to the same person. ICE was attempting to take Corona-Sanchez into custody on Wednesday when a person whom agents believed to be him crashed a car into several vehicles, fled on foot, and appeared to enter the Dorset Street home. Migrant Justice officials, however, said Corona-Sanchez, the previous owner of the car involved in the initial crashes, was never in the area on Wednesday.

A federal warrant issued Wednesday permitted agents to go into the home to “effectuate the arrest” of Corona-Sanchez. Tensions rose when a judge signed off on an arrest warrant, allowing federal agents to force their way through the crowd and break into the house. The outcome left two realities side by side: a forceful entry backed by a warrant, and a target who was not found inside.

Gov. Phil Scott, Sarah George, and Nathan Virag press for accountability in Vermont

Public anger and official criticism spread Thursday, aimed less at the existence of enforcement than at how it unfolded. Gov. Phil Scott, a Republican, called the tactics “totally unnecessary. ” He said the actions of federal law enforcement from outside Vermont demonstrated “a lack of training, coordination, leadership, and outdated tactics” that put peaceful protesters and Vermont law enforcement in a difficult situation.

Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George condemned what she called federal agents’ intimidation tactics and use of force against unarmed protesters. She said she is asking the U. S. Attorney’s Office to open an investigation. In her statement, George said that, based on her conversations with local law enforcement and as confirmed by witness accounts, videos, and photographs, “ICE chose escalation over professionalism at every turn, ” producing “chaos, harm, and fear” in the community.

For the three immigrants taken from the house, the questions are immediate and personal. Federal agents detained a 31-year-old Honduran man and two Ecuadorian sisters, one 20 and the other 31, federal court records state. Local attorneys confirmed the detainees were Cristian Humberto Jerez Andrade, 31, and two sisters: Daysi Camila Patin Patin, 20, and Jissela Johana Patin Patin, 31.

Jerez Andrade was being held in Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans. The two women were booked and released from Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility in South Burlington on Thursday morning and remained in ICE custody, said Nathan Virag, a lawyer with the Association of Africans Living in Vermont. Their attorneys have filed petitions to prevent the Department of Homeland Security from transferring their clients outside Vermont while they pursue their release.

Virag said an emergency motion for a court order to prevent Jerez Andrade’s removal from Vermont was approved on Thursday, and he filed a habeas corpus petition in U. S. District Court arguing that DHS failed to provide a lawful basis for his detention. Court documents state Jerez Andrade has lived in the U. S. for 10 years after being forced to flee Honduras. Virag said the Patin Patin sisters are from Ecuador and both are asylum seekers in the U. S. A motion to prevent the removal of Daysi Camila Patin Patin from Vermont was approved, while the status of her sister’s case was unclear. Virag said he was not sure if the sisters were already transferred out of state by 7 p. m. Thursday.

In Burlington, Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak said in a Thursday press release that one Burlington police officer had used pepper spray and that an officer was under review for allegedly using excessive force.

For the protesters who gathered on Dorset Street, the day’s final images were not of an arrest completed, but of agents using chemical irritants and flash bangs to break up a human blockade. Elliott described a scene that turned “pretty hectic, ” and the next confirmed developments now sit in court filings and official requests for review: motions to prevent removals from Vermont, petitions to stop transfers out of state, and a call from Sarah George for an investigation, while the target of the warrant remains at large.