Detention officers escort a handcuffed person from a white van into a federal immigration office in downtown Fresno on Oct. 7, 2026. Photo by Larry Valenzuela for CalMatters
In a dim storefront near downtown Fresno, a family gathered to mourn.
They wore memorial T-shirts, lit candles, and told stories about their patriarch through tears and sobs.
Luis Arreguin didn’t die, but to his closest loved ones, it feels like it.
The 54-year-old skilled laborer was arrested Oct. 1 by federal immigration agents on his way to work, disappearing into a vast and opaque detention system, his family said.
As more family members arrived at his “ICE memorial” last week, his daughter Elaina Salazar tried to comfort her mother, Arreguin’s wife. The woman asked CalMatters not to use her full name despite the fact that she is a United States citizen. Her family has faced a barrage of online harassment, according to her daughter.
Arreguin came to the United States as a child and has been here for 49 years. His family says he has four children, two of them minors, and four grandchildren.
While family members prayed and hugged their kids close, a few blocks away, a larger crowd…
