loading . . . ALBANY PARK — Three members of an Albany Park family detained by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents Sunday in Millennium Park are now being held at O’Hare Airport, according to neighbors.
Federal agents stopped Noemi Chavez; her husband, Jaime Ramirez; their 8-year-old daughter, Dasha Ramirez; and their 3-year-old son and took them away in a white van during a family outing Sunday at the park.
Witnesses saw Dasha Ramirez crying and clutching a doll during the arrests. The incident was caught on video and shared widely on social media. Chavez told the Tribune the family made the outing because Dasha “really wanted to visit Millennium Park.” Dasha and her little brother were playing in the water at the Crown Fountain when federal agents approached their parents, according to the Tribune.
Jaime Ramirez was detained on Sunday. Credit: Provided
Albany Park resident Lauren Rappold said she saw the photos and videos of the family being detained and recognized them immediately. Her son attends Grover Cleveland Elementary School and is in the same third-grade class as Dasha.
Rappold shared the information in a Cleveland Elementary moms group and spoke with a neighbor who had been able to get in contact with Chavez via WhatsApp. The neighbor, who asked not to be identified, told Rappold that Chavez and her two children had been taken to O’Hare’s immigration customs enforcement area at Terminal 5.
Chavez told the Tribune that federal officers declined to show her a warrant during the arrest. Border Protection did not respond to a request for comment.
U.S. Border Patrol Agents are staged in Gold Coast Sunday, Sept. 28, 2025. Credit: Provided
Rappold brought a bag with fresh clothes, diapers and medicine to O’Hare on Monday morning. Chavez confirmed she got the bag over WhatsApp and said she was told she will be kept at O’Hare until there are enough people to fill a plane to send to a detention center in Texas, Rappold said.
Chavez also wrote that only women and children are being held at O’Hare and that Jaime Ramirez is at the ICE processing center in Broadview, Rappold said. According to the Tribune, two other mothers— one with a 5-year-old and one with a 10-year-old — are being held at O’Hare.
All three families were detained in the Chicago area over the weekend, according to the Tribune.
Rappold said she’s not sure how to explain what happened to her 8-year-old son.
“Everyone recognizes the family — they are all very nice,” she said. “They are a part of our community, and it’s heartbreaking, absolutely heartbreaking.
“They’re locking up children.”
Rappold said Chavez has asked for more supplies, including warm clothes because the room where they are being held is “freezing” and they were detained while wearing shorts.
The Ramirez family belonged to a majority Latino church in Albany Park. The church’s pastor Rev. Tomás Sanabria said the family emigrated from Guatemala about three years ago, and the Tribune reports they do not have legal status. Block Club is not identifying the church out of concern for the congregation’s safety.
Noemi Chavez helping out at the Albany Park church she belonged to. Credit: Provided
Sanabria helped connect the family with an apartment. He said Chavez worked for a cleaning business and Ramirez worked at a restaurant.
Sanabria said he is helping a relative figure out the family’s rent situation and helped them secure legal aid. He said he started getting calls from fellow church members as soon as the photo of the Ramirezes was published Sunday.
“The church, of course, is praying. It’s really impacted the church — it’s our first family who has been detained,” he said.
The church has been working with an immigration consultant for about six months to ensure the congregation understands the immigration system and can get connected with legal aid if necessary, Sanabria said.
The pastor said there have been some Sundays church members have stayed home because they were worried about being detained.
He said he often encourages the congregation to call the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights’ family support hotline at 855-435-7693 if they see ICE activity.
“All we hear in the news is that these people have been detained, but there’s a background story,” Sanabria said. “You have a church that’s crying. You have a church that’s hurting. You have a pastor that now has to figure out how to preach to the congregation.”
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