Status: Open
Location: Oklahoma
Co-counsel: Ron Jones (The Jones Firm, PLLC)
Case Summary:
In March 2026, immigration lawyer Yovana Lopez Medina and a client attended what should have been a routine check-in appointment in the ICE office in Oklahoma City when a low-level officer, Guzman, made the decision to detain her client. When Medina asked to speak with Guzman’s supervisor, he became irate.
Guzman shoved Medina and threatened to arrest her, as second officer, Ethan Taylor, grabbed her client and both men took him away. Unable to secure her client’s freedom, Medina posted about the unsettling incident on Facebook. That is when the systematic intimidation and surveillance of Medina began.
A Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agent directed her to delete the post and urged her to post an apology. She was first banned from the building and then subjected to enhanced security when attempting to enter, and surveilled at her home and while driving over a period of months. Medina resigned from her job at a local law firm due to pressure to “make amends” with ICE, and has since started her own practice.
NPAP and The Jones Firm represent Medina as she seeks damages for the assault, freedom of speech violations, and retaliatory intimidation she experienced at the hands of ICE agents. In October 2026, we filed an SF-95 (Claim for Damage, Injury, or Death) with the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Health and Human Services, Citizenship and Immigration Services, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement — the first step towards filing a civil rights lawsuit under the Federal Tort Claims Act.
Filing: