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<\/p>\nAdam Rose is deputy director of advocacy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation and a board member of the Los Angeles Press Club. A longtime journalist, he investigated the scene of the October 2025 incident and attended several of Mr. Parias\u2019s court hearings.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Somewhere in a sweltering<\/span> desert, cockroaches scurry around the cell of Carlitos Ricardo Parias<\/a>. He holds up a plastic bottle, gazing at the worm-like creatures swimming in his drinking water<\/a>. His other arm is turning purple<\/a> from a gunshot wound for which he says he hasn\u2019t received proper medical care.<\/p>\n His gulag isn\u2019t in a distant Soviet or banana republic. It\u2019s about an hour and a half from Disneyland, in a small California town called Adelanto.<\/p>\n After Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers shot and detained Parias last October, the Los Angeles-based journalist will cross 300 days in ICE detention on Monday. His horrifying conditions aren\u2019t unique among immigrant detainees, but Parias\u2019s case is extraordinary. Perhaps no journalist has endured such a sustained sequence of violence, prosecution, and imprisonment at the hands of the U.S. government.<\/p>\n Several American journalists have spent months in jail to protect their sources: New York Times reporter Judith Miller (85 days in 2005<\/a>), writer Vanessa Leggett (168 days ending 2002<\/a>), and freelancer Josh Wolf (226 days ending in 2007<\/a>). Last year, Emmy-winning journalist Mario Guevara<\/a> spent more than 100 days in immigration detention<\/a> before being deported, prompting national outrage<\/a>.<\/p>\n Parias long ago surpassed Wolf\u2019s record for the longest known time a journalist had spent in U.S. custody.<\/p>\n He was already prolific on social media when the immigration enforcement surge began last summer. He worked independently as Richard Noticias LA<\/a>, with over 100,000 followers on TikTok. He built that audience by chasing crime stories across California neighborhoods often overlooked by larger outlets. This time last year<\/a>, the Los Angeles City Council presented him with a proclamation honoring his efforts<\/a>.<\/p>\n Federal authorities say Parias is an undocumented immigrant who had previously evaded arrest. But their account does not explain a growing mountain of evidence.<\/p>\n On June 13, 2025, Parias arrived at an immigration raid in South LA ready to film as usual. According to witnesses, a federal agent ran into him with a vehicle. Parias was then handcuffed and left on a sidewalk while the agents continued their work. Videos show him crying out in pain and grasping at his injured leg<\/a>. Agents never provided medical attention. Eventually, a Good Samaritan pulled up in a private vehicle and took Parias to the hospital. An agent briefly<\/a> stopped them but let Parias leave \u2014\u00a0handcuffs<\/a> still on.<\/p>\n Four months later, Parias was driving along a quiet block near downtown LA. Multiple unmarked vehicles pulled up around him, carrying masked men who turned out to be federal agents. Immediately and without warning, they smashed his window, as bodycam footage<\/a> later showed. Panicked, Parias stepped on the accelerator \u2014 a meaningless move in a small car physically pinned by multiple large SUVs. Tires spun, the vehicles didn\u2019t budge, and Parias quickly took his foot off the gas.<\/p>\n One agent struggled to open the passenger door. He fumbled with his gun, as his own bodycam showed, juggling it back and forth between his hands before shooting Parias in the elbow. A U.S. marshal was also hit and was expected to recover.<\/p>\n As federal immigration agents\u2019 violence once again sent Parias to the hospital, the agents scurried into the security office of a nearby strip mall to check for surveillance footage. They downloaded it onto a thumb drive and deleted it from the mall\u2019s system<\/a>.<\/p>\n Prosecutors charged Parias with assault on a federal officer, <\/strong>offering a version of events that omitted critical context. U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli fired off a social media post<\/a> suggesting Parias had been trying to avoid deportation agents for months:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cThis morning, Parias rammed his car into agents\u2019 vehicles after they boxed him in and ordered him to submit to arrest. Parias, who had previously avoided capture by immigration authorities, refused to comply with agents\u2019 orders and escalated what could have been a simple arrest into a life-threatening situation.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Essayli\u2019s post included a single screenshot from their lone copy of the mall\u2019s footage. The full video would have painted a very different picture. He didn\u2019t release it.<\/p>\n Evidence wasn\u2019t the only thing withheld from Parias, who was discharged from the hospital days later while still on morphine. Taken directly into a federal criminal detention center in downtown Los Angeles, he was supposed to receive high doses of ibuprofen. Once in court for his initial criminal hearing, the judge learned he wasn\u2019t being given the prescribed treatment for his gunshot wound. The pain caused Parias to twist in his chair. Flummoxed, the judge implored a U.S. marshal to expedite his return to a facility where he could be given medication. The marshal refused.<\/p>\n Moments later, Parias\u2019s lawyer asked the judge if his client\u2019s teenage son \u2014 who had not been allowed to communicate with his father since the shooting \u2014 could give him a hug. Citing security protocol, the marshal also vetoed this small act of humanity. As Parias was whisked away, his son shouted across the courtroom in Spanish, \u201cte amo\u201d (\u201cI love you\u201d).<\/p>\n Parias was eventually granted bond in his criminal case. But accepting it would have meant marshals turning him over to immigration authorities, who could immediately transfer him to their own distant facility with potentially worse care. He didn\u2019t take the offer.<\/p>\n The government transferred him anyway. Adelanto is difficult to visit, hours from his lawyers and family in Los Angeles, not to mention the court itself. Prosecutors still hadn\u2019t turned over the mall footage. But bystander videos began to undermine the government\u2019s account. The judge ultimately threw out all criminal charges with prejudice<\/a>, finding that the government had violated Parias\u2019s constitutional rights.<\/p>\n The proceedings to deport Parias continue. For now, he\u2019s stuck in Adelanto.<\/p>\n Even in detention, Parias remains a journalist. The government gave him a new beat. He began reporting on the horrid conditions that he and other detainees endure. Through video recorded by his visitors and accounts relayed to other reporters<\/a>, Parias exposed the worm-like creatures in drinking water and cockroaches in cells.<\/p>\n![\"Los](\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/GettyImages-2289113233.jpg?fit=5012%2C3341\")
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