OXON HILL, Md. — Police in Prince George's County arrested a man – posing as a federal agent – they said sexually assaulted a woman in Oxon Hill under the threat of deportation.
On Tuesday around 8:15 p.m., the police department was notified about a sexual assault at the Sunrise Shopping Center on Saint Barnabas Road, a place frequented by the immigrant community.
The victim said the suspect approached her in the parking lot, flashed a badge and identified himself as an agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Prince George's County Police Department said Friday.
The victim, a Latina woman, told detectives that the suspect told her to get into his car or face deportation. Inside the vehicle, the suspect sexually assaulted her.
After an investigation, police identified the suspect as 26-year-old Victor Antonio Reed of Washington, D.C.
"When someone presents themselves to the immigrant community as an ICE agent to immigrant community, there is already a sense of fear," said Jossie Flor Sapunar with the immigrant advocate group CASA. She cited the forced sterilization of women and the separation of migrant children from their parents at the border, as just some examples of why immigrant communities fear federal agents.
A congressional investigation into medical abuse allegations determined that in 2020 immigrant women underwent "unnecessary" invasive gynecological procedures at an ICE detention center in Georgia.
Sapunar says the alleged assault is an example of people preying on the tense relationship that the immigrant community has with ICE, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security.
Reed was taken into custody following a traffic stop in Temple Hills on Thursday.
Reed is charged with first and second degree rape, impersonating a law enforcement officer, a firearms offense and additional charges.
He is in the custody of the Department of Corrections.
Anyone with information should call the Sexual Assault Unit at (301) 772-4908.