CLEVELAND, Ohio — A new report released Tuesday by the Ohio Immigrant Alliance argues that systemic failures in hiring, oversight and accountability within U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection have allowed agents accused or convicted of violent and sexual crimes to remain in positions of authority, raising concerns about public safety and federal oversight.
The 36-page report, They Walk Among Us: A List of 59 Sexually and Physically Abusive ICE and Border Agents, documents 59 cases involving current or former Department of Homeland Security employees accused, charged or convicted of violent or sexual offenses. The report contends the cases reveal patterns of inadequate vetting, weakened accountability and institutional failures rather than isolated misconduct.
“This report presents that data, examines how failures in vetting, training, accountability, and institutional culture enabled this crisis, and proposes reforms for Congress and law enforcement at every level,” the report states.
According to the report, 50 of the 59 documented individuals — 84.7 percent — were charged with or convicted of sex offenses, while 37 cases, or 62.7 percent, involved crimes against children. Thirty-five of those cases involved alleged sex offenses against minors, making that the largest category identified in the analysis.
The report also argues the problem has intensified in recent years, noting that 25 of the 59 documented cases occurred in 2025 and 2026 alone.
“The problem is getting worse, not better,” the report states, noting that 2025 and 2026 account for more than 42 percent of all documented cases.
Ohio Immigrant Alliance Executive Director Lynn Tramonte said the organization began researching the issue after noticing repeated cases involving ICE personnel in Ohio.
“After noticing a disturbing trend of Cincinnati ICE agents committing sexual or violent offenses against women, the Ohio Immigrant Alliance began looking deeper into the criminal backgrounds of other agents,” Tramonte said. “What we found disturbed us. An inordinate number of ICE and Border Patrol agents committing sex offenses against children. Rampant domestic violence. Oftentimes, these acts were committed by agents with ten and even twenty years on the force.”
The report highlights cases involving agents from both ICE and Customs and Border Protection, including allegations ranging from domestic violence and sexual assault to child exploitation and murder. The organization argues those cases demonstrate recurring failures to identify or remove employees whose conduct should have disqualified them from serving in law enforcement.
Among the examples cited is Brashad Johnson, identified in the report as the official responsible for conducting DHS background investigations who was later convicted of soliciting prostitution involving a minor. The report also discusses former Border Patrol agent John Daly III, identified as the “East Valley Serial Rapist,” and Juan David Ortiz, a former Border Patrol supervisor convicted of murdering four women.
The report further argues that some employees remained on the job or advanced within the agencies despite repeated warning signs.
“There are clear reasons why these men — and they are all men — were hired and not fired by ICE and the Border Patrol,” the report states. “Our report gets into some of it. It also proposes solutions.”
According to the analysis, Customs and Border Protection accounted for 42 of the 59 documented cases, while ICE accounted for 16. Although both agencies showed similarly high rates of sexual offenses among the documented cases, the report found ICE cases were somewhat more likely to involve child victims.
The report argues recent changes to hiring and training procedures have increased concerns about accountability.
It cites previous reporting that ICE shortened or bypassed portions of its background screening process to accelerate hiring while simultaneously reducing portions of its training curriculum.
Former ICE attorney Ryan Schwank, who previously helped train ICE officers, testified earlier this year that the agency’s instruction program had become “deficient, defective and broken.”
“On my first day, I received secretive orders to teach new cadets to violate the Constitution by entering homes without a judicial warrant,” Schwank said in testimony cited by the report. “For the last five months, I watched ICE dismantle the training program, cutting 240 hours of vital classes from a 584-hour program.”
The report also questions the department’s response to fatal encounters involving immigration enforcement officers.
“No federal officer who killed anyone while attempting to enforce civil immigration laws on U.S. streets … has been held accountable for their actions,” the report states, arguing that agency leadership consistently defended the officers involved.
Much of the report focuses on what the authors describe as a broader institutional culture that tolerates misconduct and weak accountability.
“The sexual and physical violence against women and children, documented in this report, is not an aberration within ICE and the Border Patrol — it is a reflection of the culture,” the report states.
The report further argues that recent immigration enforcement tactics — including masked officers, unmarked vehicles and aggressive street arrests — have increased risks for both the public and law enforcement while making it easier for criminals to impersonate federal agents. It cites former Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske, who criticized those tactics as falling outside accepted policing practices.
“Immigration laws are about paperwork. They should be enforced like tax and other civil laws, not with guns on the streets of United States communities,” Tramonte said. “There is no civil law worth killing people over.”
The Ohio Immigrant Alliance concludes the report by urging Congress to freeze additional funding for ICE and Customs and Border Protection until reforms are implemented, require comprehensive background screening and ongoing accountability measures for officers, establish independent oversight, and restructure immigration enforcement to reflect the civil nature of most immigration proceedings rather than criminal law enforcement.
Lauren Bonds, executive director of the National Police Accountability Project, echoed those concerns in the report.
“No law enforcement officer is justified in shooting into a vehicle, ever,” Bonds said. “No one deserves to be shot by a federal agent on their way to work, and enforcing a civil law is never more important than a person’s life.”
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