Charlotte man arrested by agents was ‘trying to protect immigrants,’ family says
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Border Patrol in Charlotte
U.S. Border Patrol began making rounds in Charlotte on Saturday morning.
This follows recent Border Patrol activity in Chicago that made headlines, with some reports alleging agents violated people’s rights.
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Miguel Angel Garcia Martinez snapped photos of masked agents with long guns, hopped into his work van and pressed send — hoping the photos would steer people away from places U.S. Border Patrol agents patrolled as they arrived in Charlotte this weekend.
Now, the 24-year-old is bouncing across North Carolina jail beds and facing federal felony charges.
Martinez was arrested and charged on Sunday with using his Dodge Sprinter van as “a deadly or dangerous weapon” to assault, resist and impede federal agents, according to federal court documents.
In a phone call with The Charlotte Observer on Tuesday evening, Martinez’s brother and his brother’s girlfriend introduced a different story.
His family doesn’t deny that Martinez was following officers and taking photos of them. But the assault charges he faces are “false,” said Lienarani Bermudez, his brother’s girlfriend. And his expected four-night or longer stay in various jails is taking a toll on his family, she said.
Border Patrol arrests U.S. citizen in Charlotte
Martinez, a U.S.-born man whose parents immigrated from Mexico, was “trying to protect immigrants” as Border Patrol agents rolled into Charlotte in droves, Bermudez told the Observer. He grew up in Charlotte and now lives in Concord.
Masked federal police in paramilitary gear started confronting people in public spaces on Saturday. Agents have arrested more than 250 people in Charlotte and detained and threatened some U.S. citizens in the process, the Observer reported.
“It’s already been so scary lately with all these people getting detained by ICE,” Bermudez, 19, said. “He had it in him to try and locate (agents) and send it to an Instagram account to make sure people don’t go to those areas.”
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He first located agents Sunday outside a Home Depot on University City Boulevard, his brother said. He followed them to a U.S. Postal Service office in northwest Charlotte, at 6700 N. Tryon St., according to court documents in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina.
As he took photos, one agent made “a gesture with his hands,” documents say, and Martinez interpreted it as: What are you doing here? Officers later said they were warning him “to stop following and impeding Border patrol operations.”
Martinez got in his van, uploaded the photos and left.
He did the same outside a bowling alley on North Tryon Street.
When he turned out of that lot, he found another convoy of agents outside the Pull-A-Part auto parts store, according to court documents. There, he started “circling the parked Border Patrol vehicles twice,” taking photos, and “the second time came within eight or ten feet” of them, officials said.
“Two Border Patrol officers exited their vehicles and began giving Martinez commands to exit his vehicle,” according to the criminal complaint. “One Border Patrol Officer grabbed the handle of Martinez’s van and attempted to open the door.” Martinez drove away while “the Border Patrol Officer pounded,” court documents say.
Agents said he struck a Ford Expedition with active lights and sirens that was being used by ICE agents. Videos appear to show Martinez maneuvering around several cars as he drove away.
In a later interview with federal officers, Martinez “refused to answer” whether he drove recklessly” and “whether he struck a federal law enforcement vehicle.”
He recalled that agents boxed him in after chasing him. Then, according to court documents, one Border Patrol agent was “injured breaking the glass” of the van’s window.
That “shouldn’t count against” Martinez, Bermudez said. “That’s what [agents] did, not something he did.”
After officers broke the glass, Martinez told them he had a gun in the car, according to court documents. Then they took Martinez to Atrium Health Pineville for undisclosed injuries, according to court documents. Bermudez and her boyfriend, Brayan Vicente Martinez, 18, learned that after they found his car with a broken window on the side of the road. They went to the hospital to try to find him.
Brayan Martinez said he brought his brother’s birth certificate — “anything to prove he was a citizen.”
The couple thinks they saw Miguel Martinez through a blacked out window of a van before it drove off. They saw his hair, a silhouette of his face and his ear. If it was him, that was the last time they saw him. They didn’t know he would be in federal court for his initial appearance Monday. They didn’t know where he was for days.
But they’ll be at his detention hearing Thursday, protesting peacefully outside the federal courthouse in Charlotte at 11:30 a.m. before the afternoon hearing.
Brayan Martinez told the Observer his big brother is always good with money — good at making it and good at saving it to help his family.
Miguel Martinez is the sole provider for his girlfriend and their two children, a 3-year-old daughter and 1-year-old son. They need him back, Bermudez said. For four days now, whenever anyone calls their mom, the young girl yells: “Hi Daddy!”
It’s not daddy, the mother replies.
The cries are constant, and the sleep is rare.
“Growing up in an immigrant household made him scared his family would be taken,” Bermudez said
Now, he’s taken.
Border Patrol, ICE in NC
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security in a news release said there have been 99 vehicle attacks against federal law enforcement since Jan. 20, which they said is more than double the 47 attacks faced during the same period last year.
“It’s staggering,” said Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, who grew up in North Carolina, in an interview with Fox News. He blamed North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein’s statements on Border Patrol for a rise in vehicle attacks.
Stein in a video Monday evening said Border Patrol was not acting legally and “racially profiling,” “stoking fear and dividing our community” in Charlotte.
This story was originally published November 19, 2025 at 3:01 PM with the headline "Charlotte man arrested by agents was ‘trying to protect immigrants,’ family says."
