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Siouxland residents protest for Des Moines superintendent being held in Woodbury County jail
Protesters decried the arrest of Des Moines Public Schools Superintendent Ian Roberts by federal immigration agents
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SIOUX CITY — Several dozen Sioux City area residents showed up to the Woodbury County Law Enforcement Center on Saturday afternoon to show support for Des Moines Public Schools Superintendent Ian Roberts, who was arrested Friday by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and is being held in the jail.
About 30 or so people showed up to the Woodbury County LEC on Saturday to protest Roberts' detention. A jail log search for the Woodbury LEC shows that Roberts, who was detained Friday, was booked at 5:14 p.m., Friday in Sioux City. The charge listed is "Warrant foreign" and no bond amount was listed as of Saturday afternoon.
Barricades were spread out in front of the LEC and protesters were told not to cross them. Several officers were standing on the roof of the building and a scope could be seen peeking out toward protesters.
"I'm kind of sick and tired of all this ICE bull crap that's happening every single time on the news," Marcus Jarvis, a South Sioux City resident, said. "So any single time that I can jump in and do anything to help bring awareness to all of this bull crap I absolutely want to do that."
What's happened so far
The arrest of the longtime educator, who ICE says was in the country illegally and had no work authorization, has received national and international coverage as Roberts is one of the highest profile civilians to be detained by the federal agency since President Donald Trump retook the White House in January.
ICE said it targeted Roberts, who is from the South American country of Guyana, because he was "subject to a final removal order issued in 2024," according to reporting from the Associated Press.
According to the Associated Press, ICE initiated a traffic stop Friday morning while Roberts was driving a vehicle issued by Des Moines Public Schools. Officers say he fled and that they found his vehicle abandoned near a wooded area. Eventually officers found him and took him into ICE custody with assistance from Iowa State Patrol.
Roberts, who has previously said he is a long time gun owner and hunter, had a loaded handgun, a fixed blade knife and $3,000 in cash at the time of his arrest.
A spokesperson for Des Moines Public Schools, Phil Roeder, said the district hadn't seen anything to suggest "he's not a citizen" and said a third party did a comprehensive background check on Roberts and that he completed an I-9 document to show he was authorized to work.
Jackie Norris, the Des Moines Public School Board president, said Roberts, who was hired in July 2023, was an "integral part of our school community" and has "shown up in ways big and small."
Roberts previously served as the superintendent of the Millcreek Township School District in northwestern Pennsylvania. Court records in Pennsylvania show Roberts pleaded guilty in January 2022 to a minor infraction for unlawfully possessing a loaded firearm in a vehicle and was fined $100 plus court costs. That came after Roberts was stopped after finishing a day of hunting.
A website for Coppin State University in Baltimore, Maryland lists Roberts as an alumni from the class of 1998. There Roberts says his father immigrated to the United States in the 1980s and his mom came in the early 2000s.
What protesters said
"We need to stand up for our freedoms and stand up for our rights and our freedom to speak and we need to stand up for this," Sioux City resident Gary Davis told The Journal. "We need to have the courts involved where they go through due process."
Davis insisted that Roberts should have a lawyer and that "we can't keep doing this."
Another protester, Jasmine Johnson, of Sioux City, agreed.
"I believe that due process should be done correctly and I don't think they should have done that. Considering he's a superintendent they definitely had done a background check," she said.
Several other protest attendees declined to be interviewed and said it was for "fear of being targeted."
Despite online chatter about people being "bussed in," only one protester The Journal talked with was from outside Siouxland. An overwhelming majority of the cars in the parking lot of the LEC had plates for Woodbury County.
Early Friday afternoon, the ICE website listed Roberts as being detained in the Pottawattamie County jail. But Pottawattamie County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Jim Doty told The Council Bluffs Daily Nonpareil that "he is not detained here." "He might be in route here, but we don't know who’s coming or who’s not coming until they are on our booking floor," Doty said.
Roberts is far from the only ICE detainee to be placed in the Woodbury County LEC. Over the past three weeks, The Journal has reported on two different cases of local inmates challenging their ICE detention.
Fredy Chilel Chilel of Estherville, Iowa filed a petition for habeas corpus in U.S. District Court in Sioux City on Sept. 10 and has asked for his release while the U.S. Department of Homeland Security appeals an immigration judge's order to release him on bond.
Chilel Chilel’s petition followed another filed Sept. 4 by Yeison Lopez Lopez, a Guatemala native jailed in Woodbury County since his July arrest on a probation violation, which was dismissed after ICE put a hold on him on Aug. 5. After the Lopez Lopez petition was filed, Woodbury County Sheriff Chad Sheehan said the LEC houses ICE detainees but declined to say how many and cited safety concerns.
Roberts' arrest on Friday came just one day after plain clothes agents, who only identified themselves as "federal agents," tackled Jorge Gonzalez Ochoa at a grocery store in downtown Iowa City, pinned him to the floor and handcuffed him as onlookers watched. The Roberts and Gonzalez Ochoa arrests have triggered protests in Des Moines and Iowa City.
Johnson said she's worried that such arrests are just the beginning and is fearful that even more deportations will happen in the future.
"Once they start, they won't stop."
Reporting from Lee Des Moines Bureau Chief Maya Marchel Hoff, Council Bluffs Daily Nonpareil Managing Editor Scott Stewart and Sioux City Journal reporter Nick Hytrek contributed to this story.
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