🔗 Share this article National Immigration Agents in the Windy City Required to Utilize Body Cameras by Court Order A US court has required that federal agents in the Chicago area must use recording devices following numerous incidents where they employed projectiles, canisters, and tear gas against demonstrators and city officers, appearing to violate a prior legal decision. Legal Frustration Over Enforcement Tactics Federal Judge Sara Ellis, who had before mandated immigration agents to show credentials and prohibited them from using crowd-control methods such as irritants without warning, expressed strong frustration on Thursday regarding the federal agency's ongoing aggressive tactics. "My home is in this city if folks didn't realize," she remarked on Thursday. "And I'm not blind, am I wrong?" Ellis further stated: "I'm receiving pictures and observing images on the news, in the publication, examining documentation where I'm experiencing concerns about my decision being obeyed." Broader Context This new directive for immigration officers to wear body cameras comes as Chicago has emerged as the current center of the national leadership's removal operations in recent times, with aggressive agency operations. Meanwhile, community members in Chicago have been organizing to block arrests within their neighborhoods, while the Department of Homeland Security has described those activities as "disturbances" and stated it "is using suitable and lawful steps to uphold the justice system and protect our personnel." Recent Incidents Recently, after enforcement personnel conducted a car chase and caused a multiple-vehicle accident, protesters yelled "Ice go home" and threw items at the officers, who, apparently without alert, deployed tear gas in the direction of the demonstrators – and 13 city police who were also present. Elsewhere on Tuesday, a officer with face covering cursed at demonstrators, ordering them to move back while restraining a 19-year-old, Warren King, to the pavement, while a bystander yelled "he's a citizen," and it was unclear why King was under arrest. Over the weekend, when lawyer Samay Gheewala tried to demand personnel for a court order as they arrested an immigrant in his neighborhood, he was shoved to the sidewalk so strongly his hands were injured. Community Impact At the same time, some local schoolchildren were obliged to stay indoors for recess after chemical agents spread through the roads near their playground. Similar anecdotes have been documented nationwide, even as former agency executives caution that detentions appear to be non-selective and broad under the expectations that the national leadership has put on officers to remove as many persons as possible. "They appear unconcerned whether or not those persons represent a threat to community security," an ex-director, a ex-enforcement chief, commented. "They simply state, 'If you're undocumented, you qualify for removal.'"