Houston police called federal immigration agents on a woman who dialed 911 to report domestic abuse by her ex-husband in April, newly released records show. 

The woman, an immigrant from El Salvador who has lived in Houston for seven years, had a removal order stemming from the denial of her asylum claim. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents declined to pick her up because they said there was no one to take custody of her children, according to a copy of the police report obtained by the Houston Chronicle through a public records request.

The woman hasn't yet been taken into federal custody, but victims' advocates said the incident is a worst-case scenario for those worried about the worsening state of domestic violence in the region and the likelihood that women will avoid reporting problems to law enforcement.

"Anecdotally, we know there's a huge fear in the immigrant community about reporting any type of incident to law enforcement because of the fear of being deported," said Amy Smith, deputy director at the Harris County Domestic Violence Coordinating Council.

An HPD spokesperson defended the officer's actions, saying he was simply following protocol. 

"An officer responding to an assault call conducted a routine criminal history check on the reportee and discovered she had an active ICE warrant," the department spokesperson said. "As with any law enforcement warrant, the officer is required to notify the appropriate agency. The officer continued to assist the reportee professionally, providing her with victim support resources and maintaining a high level of service."

Houston mayor denies cooperating with ICE

"People who are victims of domestic violence are encouraged to call police for help regardless of their immigration status," Whitmire said of the recent report. "The city enforces state and local laws."

A spokesperson for the mayor said he's been consistent that the agency will help people regardless of immigration status. But officers have no choice but to contact any agency when they find a warrant.

The April incident is one of dozens of cases in which Houston police officers have called ICE agents since the immigration authority added roughly 700,000 names of people with administrative warrants, most of which are outstanding deportation orders, to a national law enforcement database. Records show Houston police have called ICE on at least 58 such people this year as of May 31.

While the internal code that police are using to log the encounters is not new, records show most years saw only one or two reports cited as immigration inquiries. The numbers have grown drastically since President Donald Trump took office in January and embarked on a widespread immigration crackdown that has seen ICE agents conduct raids at workplaces, courthouses and homes around the country.

Woman called police after months of threats

The case involving the Salvadoran woman is the first known instance in which Houston police have called immigration agents on the victim of an alleged violent crime during Trump's second term. Experts say the police department's cooperation with immigration authorities might give abusers more power and leverage over abused women.

If women fear they'll be arrested for telling police about abusive relationships, they'll be even more likely to stay with their abusers, Smith said.

The Salvadoran woman, who is not being named by the Houston Chronicle due to the sensitive nature of both her immigration status and domestic violence case, told the Chronicle that she and her two children followed her then husband to the United States in 2018 after gang members threatened to kill her family if they did not leave their home.

The couple had a third child together in Houston, but separated soon after. In 2024, she was granted a protective order against him due to repeated abuse, Harris County court records show.

His harassment didn't stop. He frequently confronted her at work and in public, armed with guns or knives, and threatened to kill her, she said. In April, he accosted her as she went grocery shopping in her southeast Houston neighborhood, so she quickly drove home and called police, she said.

Officers arrived shortly after and asked her to step out of her house, which she did after some initial reluctance, she said. They kept her outside for about 40 minutes, she said. After she showed them her protective order and marks from where her ex-husband had hit her, she said officers gave her a phone number for victim support services and allowed her back inside. 

It wasn't until she called the number the next day that she learned the police had called immigration agents on her. The officer who answered the phone told her that the police report noted that ICE had been contacted, and advised her not to make a report in person or risk being detained, she said.

Fear of reporting crimes

The police report, dated a day after the incident, notes the woman had an administrative immigration warrant that said she was unlawfully present in the country. The report states that the officer called ICE, which confirmed the warrant, but that an agent informed them that they "will attempt to arrest complainant another time due to no one taking custody of complainant's children." 

The woman said she is unlikely to report it to police if her ex-husband violated his protective order again.

"If he were to hurt me again, I don't think I could report it because that's where my story would end," the woman said.

Doug Griffith, president of the Houston Police Officers Union, pushed back on allegations that officers were willingly cooperating with ICE in a recent interview.

"We're not asking people for their immigration status, I can tell you that," he said.

But Griffith acknowledged, especially with the Trump administration's ongoing immigration crackdown and cuts to federal funds for local municipalities and nonprofit agencies, that the issue of police notifying immigration agents about administrative warrants was a touchy subject.

"If you don't do what the federal government is telling you to do, you could lose funding," Griffith said. "We can't afford to lose millions of dollars in funding."

Zenobia Lai, executive director of the Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative, said the incident is a clear-cut example of the danger posed when local police officers get involved with immigration enforcement. Normally, her organization advises immigrants who are victims of a crime to report it to police, but now she acknowledges that many may be hesitant to do so. 

"It worsens public safety when victims of a crime are not going to report or cooperate with investigators for fear that they may end up being deported," Lai said. "That doesn't make any of us any safer."