ICE Boston Arrests 118 Illegal Aliens During 4-Day Operation in Southern Connecticut
ICE’s Boston field office says its agents arrested 118 illegal aliens during a four-day operation “the week of Aug. 24” in southern Connecticut. The agency’s release describes arrestees’ criminal histories only in general terms — crimes “that range from sexual assault against a child, child abuse, weapons charges, drug dealing and assault” — without a numeric breakdown by category.
ICE Boston’s acting field office director used the release to name a culprit for why the operation was necessary: Connecticut’s TRUST Act, the state sanctuary law that limits when local police can hold someone on an immigration detainer alone. The Justice Department is already suing the state over that same law.
Connecticut’s governor, two mayors, and a U.S. senator condemned the operation within days — several of them while simultaneously fighting DOJ’s lawsuit over the law ICE says made the sweep necessary in the first place.
- 118 — illegal aliens ICE Boston says its agents arrested during a 4-day operation in southern Connecticut, the week of Aug. 24, 2026 · Source: ICE
- 15 years — prison sentence already served by Harvin Rivera-Guardado (Honduras), one of five named cases ICE cited to substantiate the operation · Source: ICE
- 13 — additional felony categories added to the TRUST Act's detainer exceptions by Connecticut's 2025 expansion, Public Act 25-29 · Source: CT Mirror
- April 13, 2026 — date the Justice Department sued Connecticut, Gov. Lamont, AG Tong, New Haven, and Mayor Elicker over the TRUST Act · Source: DOJ
- 5 — named illustrative cases ICE cited out of the 118 total arrests — the agency gave no numeric breakdown for the rest · Source: ICE
ICE’s own release places the operation “the week of Aug. 24” in “southern Connecticut” — that is the exact language in the agency’s text, which does not name a specific city or give a more precise start-and-end date. Local outlets covering the same week narrowed the window to roughly Aug. 24 through Aug. 27 and placed enforcement activity in cities including Danbury and Stamford, but that town-level detail comes from CT Mirror, WFSB, and other local reporting — not from ICE’s release itself.
On the arrestees’ criminal histories, ICE’s release is qualitative rather than quantitative. The agency says “numerous” of the 118 “have been charged with crimes that range from sexual assault against a child, child abuse, weapons charges, drug dealing and assault” — without stating how many arrestees fall into any single category. To back up that language, ICE named five illustrative cases: a mix of adjudicated convictions and still-pending charges.
Three of the five are convictions, stated here as fact. Harvin Rivera-Guardado, of Honduras, was convicted of sexual assault risking injury to a child and sentenced to 15 years. Lenny Guitierrez-Pichardo, of the Dominican Republic, was convicted of selling hallucinogens and narcotics and of selling or manufacturing cannabis, for which he received a five-year sentence; he also faces pending larceny and resisting-arrest charges. Edwin Marroquin, of Guatemala, was convicted of driving while intoxicated, unlicensed operation, obstructing governmental administration, operating under the influence, carrying a dangerous weapon, and criminal trespass.
The other two are pending charges only, presented as alleged. Jason Tocagon-Leon, of Ecuador, is charged with two counts of risk of injury to a child, breach of peace, and assault. Arnulfo Nolberto Quizhpi-Sanchez, of Ecuador, is charged with assault, disorderly conduct, threatening, criminal trespass, and violation of conditions of release. Neither has been convicted, and both are presumed innocent unless and until a court says otherwise. This operation is also separate from “Operation Broken Trust,” an earlier ICE Boston action that arrested 65 people in Connecticut in August 2025 — a different sweep, a different total, not to be conflated with this one.
ICE Boston didn’t just announce the arrests — it named a reason the operation was necessary at all. Acting Field Office Director David T. Wesling used the release to single out Connecticut’s sanctuary law directly, tying it to the Rivera-Guardado case above.
“Sanctuary politicians in Connecticut have made it abundantly clear that they would rather stand with criminal illegal aliens such as Harvin Rivera-Guardado, a convicted sexual predator, than protect law-abiding American citizens. While these politicians continue their performative and misguided attempts to obstruct our enforcement through absurd legislation such as the TRUST Act, ERO Boston will continue to protect Connecticut communities from these dangerous criminals.”
David T. Wesling, Acting Field Office Director, ICE Boston · ICE news release
The law Wesling means is Connecticut’s TRUST Act, first enacted in 2013 and expanded since. In its current form, it bars state and local law enforcement from holding someone in custody solely on the strength of an ICE detainer request unless ICE produces a judicial warrant, the person appears on a terrorism watchlist, or the person has a conviction or guilty plea for one of a specified list of serious felonies. A 2025 expansion, Public Act 25-29, added roughly 13 more qualifying crimes to that list, including child sexual abuse material offenses and risk-of-injury-to-a-child charges — categories that overlap with more than one of the cases ICE named above.
The Justice Department is not waiting for the next ICE press release to make its case against the law. On April 13, 2026, DOJ sued the State of Connecticut, Gov. Lamont, Attorney General William Tong, the City of New Haven, and New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker, arguing the TRUST Act’s detainer restrictions violate the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause by obstructing federal immigration enforcement. DOJ Civil Division Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate said the suit was meant to end “such open defiance of federal law”: “For years, Connecticut communities have paid the price of these misguided sanctuary policies.”
Gov. Ned Lamont (D-CT) did not welcome the operation. “Connecticut does not want, nor do we need, the type of presence ICE has had in our state this week,” he said — a statement that lands differently given that Lamont is himself a named defendant in DOJ’s TRUST Act lawsuit.
Danbury Mayor Roberto Alves (D), who also chairs the Connecticut Democratic Party, condemned what he called the operation’s “brutality” and noted that ICE activity occurred outside an elementary school on the first day of the school year. On Aug. 26, Alves joined Lamont, Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-CT), and Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) at a press event responding to the operation.
Stamford Mayor Caroline Simmons (D) used similar language: “I continue to be horrified by the cruelty of these actions ... Our city is not made safer when people are randomly removed from our streets.”
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) went further than a press statement. He formally requested that the DHS Inspector General investigate the operation, citing what he called the “cruelty and brutality” of the ICE surge, and separately requested a meeting with DHS Secretary Mullin.
Attorney General William Tong (D-CT) is a named co-defendant in DOJ’s TRUST Act lawsuit alongside New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker (D)— meaning the same law ICE blamed for this operation is, separately, the subject of active federal litigation the state’s own officials are defending in court.
David T. Wesling — Acting Field Office Director, ICE Boston; blamed the TRUST Act for making the operation necessary.
Gov. Ned Lamont (D-CT) — said Connecticut did not want ICE’s presence; named defendant in DOJ’s TRUST Act lawsuit.
AG William Tong (D-CT) — named co-defendant in DOJ’s TRUST Act lawsuit.
Danbury Mayor Roberto Alves (D) — chairs the CT Democratic Party; condemned the operation's “brutality.”
Stamford Mayor Caroline Simmons (D) — called the operation's actions cruel.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) — requested a DHS Inspector General investigation.
Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-CT) and Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) — joined the Aug. 26 press event responding to the operation.
New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker (D) — named co-defendant in DOJ’s TRUST Act lawsuit.
Brett Shumate — DOJ Civil Division Assistant Attorney General; filed the TRUST Act lawsuit April 13, 2026.
What ICE’s release does not do is quantify its own central claim. “Numerous” arrestees facing serious charges is not a number, and the agency has not broken out how many of the 118 face charges in each category it lists, how many have prior convictions versus pending charges only, or how many were arrested on immigration status alone with no criminal charge at all. The five cases above are the ones ICE chose to name — not necessarily the five most serious, and not disclosed as a representative sample of the full 118.
That gap cuts both ways. It doesn’t undercut the cases backed by actual convictions — Rivera-Guardado’s 15-year sentence and Marroquin’s string of convictions are matters of court record, not press-release rhetoric. But it also means the full scope of “numerous” remains, for now, a claim the public has to take on ICE’s word rather than verify against a published breakdown — the same gap that lets both sides of Connecticut’s sanctuary-policy fight point to this operation as proof of their own argument.
ICE Boston arrested 118 people in a four-day sweep of southern Connecticut and named five cases — three with actual convictions, two still pending — to back an unquantified claim about the group’s criminal histories. The agency’s own field director blamed Connecticut’s TRUST Act for making the operation necessary; the governor, two mayors, a U.S. senator, and the attorney general all pushed back, several of them while simultaneously defending that same law against a Justice Department lawsuit in federal court. Both fights are ongoing.
