A Stuart woman Tased twice — once after she already fell — is highlighted in a national ACLU report documenting alleged abuses of power under the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
The American Civil Liberties Union found 432 cases of misconduct by local, state and federal law enforcement after analyzing over 1,200 incidents across eight states in what it calls the “first in-depth civil rights review” of 2025 immigration enforcement actions. At least 155 U.S. citizens were detained or targeted.
The ACLU found:
The 67-page report opens with the Oct. 23 arrest of Floridalma Sanchez-Gomez in Golden Gate, a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood. Its account of law enforcement officers busting into her house to arrest her two brothers draws on TCPalm’s reporting and the videos it obtained. Florida Highway Patrol trooper detained all three.
Sanchez’s 13-year-old niece came home from school that day to a shattered door and federal agents scattered about the lawn, neighbor Caitlynne Palmieri told TCPalm.
“There was no adult left for her,” Palmieri said. “She was wide-eyed and shaking.”
Stuart woman Tased in Golden Gate
Sanchez was lawfully present in the country with a pending asylum case at the time, TCPalm first reported Nov. 3.
Trooper Joshua Evans grabbed the 5-foot-tall woman by the shirt in her driveway with his TASER drawn, bystanders’ videos show. When she ran toward her house, he fired his TASER into her back, she fell — and he fired again.
The incident began when Evans, in an unmarked vehicle, tried to stop Sanchez for tinted window violations and turning right at a red light without coming to a complete stop. While following her, he activated his lights and siren when she reached 40 mph in a 25 mph zone, the report says.
When she pulled into her driveway a half-mile down the road, her brothers ran into the house, the report says. Evans immediately pulled his TASER and told Sanchez, who speaks only Spanish, to place her hands behind her back.
Within minutes, over a dozen troopers along with agents from Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission — which has nearly 800 officers credentialed to enforce immigration law — were on the scene, some wielding assault-style weapons. An FHP helicopter hovered overhead.
The arrests came during a weeklong joint operation between FHP, ICE and Border Patrol in mid-October that spanned Martin and St. Lucie counties.
Sanchez was charged with fleeing and resisting an officer, then was released on bond. Her case is moving through the Martin County court system. Her brother was deported to Guatemala, she later told TCPalm.
U.S. citizen arrested during immigration operation
The ACLU report also mentions a U.S. citizen who was detained that day. Josynia Aleman, 19, of Stuart, watched the incident alongside TCPalm as authorities busted into Sanchez’s house with a crowbar and sledgehammer.
“How many people does it take to arrest someone?” Aleman shouted at them.
An FHP trooper noticed Aleman was “being very loud and causing a scene” and was too close to the vehicle where one of Sanchez’s brothers was being placed, her arrest report states.
Troopers repeatedly told Aleman to stand 25 feet back, but she refused, the report says. One trooper, who “noted he wore a size 12 shoe,” measured out 25 feet from the scene. When he found Aleman was too close, he arrested her under violation of Florida’s “HALO Law,” which requires a mandatory 25-foot buffer zone around first responders.
From down the street, Aleman’s mother, Jessica, yelled at authorities to release her daughter, TCPalm witnessed. A video shows two troopers briefly grabbing the mother by the arms.
“They were trying to manhandle me, but I knew my rights,” she later told TCPalm. “We were just out there practicing our First Amendment rights, and they didn’t like what we had to say.”
A group of neighbors paid Aleman’s $150 bail.
ACLU: most civil rights abuses go under the radar
The ACLU report states thousands of cases like Sanchez’s get little if any national news coverage, and most abuses of power go unreported.
It compares low-profile cases like hers to the national outcry sparked by the killings of U.S. citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good by ICE and CBP agents in Minneapolis.
“These lesser-known stories show that the horrific abuses our nation witnessed in Minneapolis were not an aberration — in fact, they are the tip of the iceberg,” the report reads. “What happened in Minnesota did not start in Minnesota, and it continues in communities across the United States as ICE and CBP’s funding and footprint continues to expand to a degree never before seen.”
In additional to TCPalm’s reporting, the report cites prior ACLU litigation and research and investigations conducted by Congress and human rights groups. Most incidents occurred on the streets, but others happened at places of work, courthouses and immigration check-ins.
Florida cited as example of racial profiling
The report focuses on eight states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland and New Mexico.
Florida is a case study for racial profiling, the report says. Of FHP’s 1,819 sworn troopers, the agency reported 1,774 are credentialed as “designated immigration officers.”
TCPalm previously reported how FHP disproportionately ticketed and arrested Hispanic drivers for minor traffic infractions in 2024-25. For example, Hispanic drivers were 41% more likely than White drivers to be ticketed or arrested after being stopped for not wearing a seatbelt.
The ACLU reviewed “dozens of instances where traffic stops became deportation traps” — in Florida specifically. At a pre-operation briefing witnessed by the Wall Street Journal, FHP Master Sgt. Tony Kingery directed troopers to focus on a Palm Beach County area he called “saturated with possible illegals,” telling them to “stop those cars for good violations.”
There were 65 incidents of likely racial profiling in Florida — third-highest of the eight states, behind Illinois (156) and California (104).
That included the viral arrest of 18-year-old U.S. citizen Kenny Laynez-Ambrosio. Video shows him being put in a chokehold and told: “You don’t have any rights here. You are a ‘Migo, brother,” which roughly translates to “homie.”
Jack Lemnus is a TCPalm enterprise reporter. Contact him at jack.lemnus@tcpalm.com, 772-409-1345, or follow him on X @JackLemnus.
This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Florida woman Tased by FHP is at center of national ACLU abuse report
Reporting by Jack Lemnus, Treasure Coast Newspapers / Treasure Coast Newspapers
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Jack Lemnus, Treasure Coast Newspapers | USA TODAY Network
