Video showing a Ukrainian woman being arrested by immigration agents at San Francisco International Airport on Wednesday is drawing attention and raising questions about how the arrest was carried out. This comes alongside a spike in similar stories around the country since June, a trend that has attorneys cautioning their clients not to fly.
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Video taken of this incident shows a woman in a white shirt and dark pants on the ground outside a store at SFO, while two men — who appear to be dressed in plainclothes — pin her to the floor.
The woman shouts out, “You’re choking me!” and “Please help me!” as people gather around and ask the men what they are arresting her for.
At one point, the woman shouts out, “I’m from Ukraine!”
Doria Robinson, who happens to be a city council member for the city of Richmond, was in the airport just before 7:45 p.m. that evening. She was waiting to board her flight at the time and recorded video of the incident, which has since been shared by many different accounts across social media.
Robinson said she was inside the Harvey Milk Terminal at the B7 gate, already past security, when she heard “a woman screaming at the top of her lungs.”
“I looked across, and I saw two men taking a woman who was in a shop across the way, pulling her down to the ground, getting on top of her as she’s screaming,” Robinson recalled.
Initially, she said she wondered if it was a domestic violence incident or human trafficking. But as Robinson walked towards the commotion, she realized something else was going on and began recording with her phone. Robinson estimated that hundreds of people around the terminal were also watching this unfold.
Robinson said that she did not see the two men wearing any clothing or identification showing who they worked for. Also, she said, despite questions from the crowd about who they were with, the men refused to answer. Ultimately, she said the men handcuffed the woman and carted her away in a wheelchair.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson confirmed to NBC Bay Area that on July 22, ICE arrested a Ukrainian woman named Iryna Gorb at SFO. The spokesperson added that when officers approached Gorb, “she attempted to flee and resisted arrest.”
DHS said Gorb lawfully entered the U.S. in 2010 on a visa that allowed her to stay in the country until the end of May of 2011. DHS said Gorb overstayed her visa and stayed in the U.S. for 15 more years.
“She will remain in ICE custody pending removal proceedings,” the DHS spokesperson said.
Several immigration attorneys told NBC Bay Area they had seen the video of this arrest on social media.
“You could hear the fear and the pain in the woman’s voice,” said Bay Area immigration attorney Ghassan Shamieh.
Shamieh does not represent Gorb, but said the video was chilling for him to watch. He said that he and other immigration attorneys in his circle have noticed a spike in detentions at airports in the past few weeks.
Shamieh said four of his clients have been detained in airports, including one last week at SFO. He added that of his clients who have been detained at airports, none of them have criminal records.
“That’s why advocates and immigration attorneys alike are advising clients not to travel via plane even domestically within the United States,” Shamieh said.
As for Robinson, she said she is disturbed by this arrest and wonders what will happen to Gorb.
“What we do know is we were complicit in it, and there was nothing we could do to help her, and that was just demoralizing, just painful,” Robinson said.
A spokesperson for SFO told NBC Bay Area Thursday that the airport doesn’t have any details about this incident “apart from what we’ve seen on social media.”
The spokesperson noted that ICE and DHS are federal agencies operating outside the jurisdiction of U.S. airports.
“As a result, we are not involved in any decisions about their operations, nor are we notified when they occur,” the spokesperson continued.