ICE Detains Gulfport Family After Court Hearing, Arrests Their Attorney for Filming

A Honduran family residing in Gulfport since 2021 was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers immediately following an immigration court hearing in New Orleans on April 16. The family’s attorney, Natasha Porsche, was also arrested while attempting to document the officers’ actions.

The family of five, including three children, had sought voluntary departure from the U.S., but the government opposed their request, citing a supposed prior deportation order. However, no such order was presented as evidence during the hearing. Despite the judge resetting the trial for next month, ICE officers waited outside the courtroom and detained the parents as they exited.

Attorney Porsche recounted how she was pushed and falsely accused of assaulting a federal agent after she began recording the detention. “He pushes me and then he screams, ‘You go to jail because you assaulted an ICE agent,’” Porsche said, insisting she never touched any officer. Within seconds of filming, she was surrounded by officers, had her phone and papers knocked to the ground, and was arrested. Porsche was later released on a citation for assault on a federal officer.

The parents remain in separate detention centers in Louisiana, leaving their oldest son—still a minor—to care for his younger siblings. He described the emotional toll, “I’m not a little boy, you know. I’m not a man too, but I have to do what I have to do.” Their youngest child is a U.S. citizen, and the family had been working to secure a passport for the child before their forced departure.

Porsche is now pursuing juvenile visas for the two older children but acknowledges there is little hope for the parents, who face likely deportation. The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the case.

This incident underscores the cruel realities of ICE’s enforcement tactics—detaining families without clear legal justification and punishing those who try to hold them accountable. It also highlights the broader systemic failure to protect immigrant families and the children caught in the crossfire.