While furious protests in Maine and Texas decried the deaths of two men shot and killed by federal immigration agents in two weeks, a more somber crowd gathered at Villa Parke in Pasadena on Wednesday night.
“We look at our phones and every day it seems there is another killing,” said Jose Madera, director of the Pasadena Community Job Center. “I came here today thinking, ‘What else can I say?’ We may not have the words, but love and solidarity is shown through action.”
Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, 52, a construction worker, was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Houston on July 7, and Johan Sebastian Guerrero, 25, a food delivery driver and father of a 3-year-old daughter, was shot and killed by an ICE officer on July 13.
Both deadly encounters came amid a recent surge in immigration operations nationwide, as the Trump administration seeks to continue a mass deportation campaign that began in June of last year.
ICE has been under pressure to beef up arrest and deportation numbers. It says people being sought are increasingly staying in their homes, and it often blames immigration advocates who advise immigrants to stay in homes unless ICE produces a warrant signed by an independent judge.
ICE officers say that means they’re forced to find other ways to make arrests.
In a social media post on the Maine shooting, the Department of Homeland Security said Guerrero had “attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon.”
And regarding the Houston shooting, DHS officials said in a statement that Araujo, a Mexican national, ignored commands while trying to evade arrest during an enforcement operation on July 7. The department said he attempted to ram his car into an agent, who opened fire in self-defense.
- Also see: Deadly immigration encounters
Araujo’s family said he was on his way to work at a construction job. He died on the way to the hospital.
And the DHS description on the shooting of Guerrero differed from one provided hours earlier by Maine Sen. Angus King, who said Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s told him that the driver had “weaponized” his vehicle against the ICE officers.
On Wednesday night, about 80 immigrant advocates and community members gathered at the Pasadena park near where three men were arrested in front of a tamale stand at Parke Street and Garfield Avenue, and another taken at nearby Marengo Avenue on the early morning of June 21, 2025.
White crosses with photos and names of people killed by ICE or during federal immigration operations were planted on the grass, near where boys in soccer jerseys (one for Argentina, and another for Spain) watched Aztec dancers bless the display with copal smoke.
All told, at least 10 people have died in incidents involving encounters with immigration officers since the start of the crackdown last year, according to the Associated Press.
A 28-year-old Mexican national fleeing federal agents in Florida this week was struck and killed by a tractor trailer.
It was familiar in Pasadena.
The vigil site Wednesday night was about 14 minutes away from the Monrovia Home Depot, where day laborer 52-year-old Roberto Carlos Montoya ran from ICE agents and was struck and killed by an SUV on the 210 freeway on Aug. 14, 2025.
In the 13 months since then, other groups have formed to protest Trump administration immigration policies and protect immigrant members of their communities, Sharon Nicholls said.
Nicholls, 57, of Pasadena, said she is a librarian and educator who never attended a protest until Montoya was chased to his death on the 210 freeway last year. Her mission has since evolved, from rallying in front of Home Depot, and phone banking, to helping detainees’ families with rent, to picking them up from Adelanto ICE Processing Center.
“Just this week I spoke to the wife of an Adelanto detainee and he asked her to send money to help another detainee, even though they couldn’t afford it, that’s our community,” Nichols said, adding the collective power of American citizens can change a lot.
The event gathered leaders from Pasadena for Palestine, CHIRLA, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, and six leaders from Pasadena’s Clergy Community Coalition, as well as the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON).
Brandon Lamar, president of the Pasadena branch of the NAACP, said the second fatal shooting by a federal officer within a week, leaves him weary and frustrated.
“Truth of the matter is, we sound like a broken record,” Lamar said. “That’s part of what hurts the most: when you show up in community for your community, for your people, for injustice, for what is not right, and it still feels like no one’s listening.”
Lamar said he and his group are calling for solidarity with immigrants.
“Whether you believe it or not, your struggle is my struggle,” he said. “So when we get tired, when we get frustrated, when we get where we don’t know what else to do, the only thing we have left is love and solidarity in our community.”
Jean Grant, director of development at the Immigration Resource Center of San Gabriel Valley, said the center is proud to stand with NDLON and other immigrant advocates.
“The sad thing for these ICE agents is that while they are attempting to dehumanize immigrants, they are actually doing damage to themselves,” Grant said. “They are losing their own souls.”
Pablo Alvarado, co-executive director of NDLON, reminded the crowd that immigrants know all about authoritarianism and civil war.
“Our country doesn’t have to go through that, but we have to raise our voices,” he said. “So I know there’s so much indignation in these moments. There’s so much sadness. There’s anxiety. And all of those feelings we have to recognize, but we have to convert them into peaceful action.”
Another vigil is planned at Villa Parke on July 25.
Pastor Rosa Candida Ramirez of La Fuente Ministries in Pasadena recited some of the names of the of people killed so far in 2026, adding while the deaths have not stopped, ordinary Americans must not stop resisting.
“We cannot normalize this,” she said. “This is all of our fight.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.