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ICE officer Israel Hernandez threatened to shoot Portland teenager during 911 call

On October 31, 2025, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Israel D. Hernandez pulled his service weapon and told a 911 dispatcher he might have to shoot a teenager who had punched the window of his unmarked SUV in Northeast Portland, Oregon. Hernandez did not fire, and the teenager fled without being identified. The confrontation surfaced publicly four months later when Oregon Public Broadcasting obtained the 911 recording and a corroborating police report via a public-records request.

Jurisdiction
Federal
Location
Portland, Oregon

Abuses documented

Actors

On October 31, 2025, around 3:30 p.m., U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Israel D. Hernandez pulled his service weapon from the center console of his unmarked SUV and told a 911 dispatcher, "I need someone here now, or else I'm going to have to shoot this kid," during a roadway confrontation in Northeast Portland, Oregon. Hernandez said a teenager riding a motorized bicycle had followed his vehicle near Northeast 82nd Avenue and Northeast Prescott Street, yelled that Hernandez was "ICE," and punched the SUV's window, breaking its side mirror. Hernandez did not fire his weapon, and the teenager left the scene without being identified.

A recording of Hernandez's roughly five-minute call to dispatchers, obtained via public-records request and reported by Oregon Public Broadcasting on February 25, 2026, is corroborated by a Portland Police Bureau report completed the same evening, which found probable cause for misdemeanor second-degree criminal mischief and second-degree disorderly conduct against the unidentified suspect. During the call, Hernandez told dispatchers he planned to get out of his vehicle; a dispatcher urged him to stay inside and drive toward a populated area instead.

The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to OPB's questions about the incident or about Hernandez's status with the agency. The confrontation occurred during a period of expanded federal immigration enforcement in Portland, including a Trump administration effort that same fall to deploy the National Guard to the city's South Waterfront ICE facility.

Why we recorded this

Accountable use of force by law enforcement means officers may use deadly force only when genuinely necessary, not as a reflexive threat against an unarmed bystander who poses no lethal danger. An ICE officer told a 911 dispatcher he might have to shoot a teenager who had punched his vehicle's window and fled on a bicycle -- a threat of lethal force over, at most, a misdemeanor property-damage confrontation. This archive records the incident because a federal officer's stated willingness to escalate to deadly force in a low-stakes street encounter, disclosed only months later through a public-records request, is the kind of unaccountable use-of-force pattern that erodes the norm that lethal force be reserved for genuine threats to life.

Sources

  1. Armed ICE officer in Portland called 911 during confrontation: 'I'm going to have to shoot this kid' — Oregon Public Broadcasting primary accessed August 10, 2026
  2. Portland ICE Officer Threatened To Shoot, 911 Tape Shows — Hoodline secondary accessed August 10, 2026

See also