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TORRANCE, Calif. (KABC) -- Several Torrance residents are demanding answers after a 9-year-old boy stopped showing up to school only to be found in federal immigration custody.

According to reports, Martir Garcia Lara and his father were taken into custody on May 29 and have since been transferred to an immigration facility in Texas.

I am deeply troubled by reports that ICE detained a fourth-grade student from Torrance Elementary and separated the child from his father at an immigration hearing.Congressman Ted Lieu

According to the Los Angeles Times, officials plan to deport them to Honduras.

Congressman Ted Lieu issued a statement on the reports, saying he's "deeply troubled."

"I am deeply troubled by reports that ICE detained a fourth-grade student from Torrance Elementary and separated the child from his father at an immigration hearing," read the statement. "ICE has not given a reason for their actions. I urge ICE to provide an explanation as soon as possible, and to inform us how they are taking care of the child. We are monitoring this situation closely and will work with local and federal officials to reunite the child with his family."

The Torrance Unified School District told Eyewitness News its aware of the reports regarding the student.

"At this time, we are unable to confirm those details and are actively working with the family and authorities to understand the facts of the situation," said the district.

"Out of respect for the student's privacy and to avoid spreading unverified information, we are not able to share any further information at this time."

Eyewitness News is working to get more information.

This is a developing story. This article will continue to be updated as more information becomes available.

A Southern California fourth grader who was detained by immigration officials was deported and is now living with his father in Honduras.

Martir Garcia Lara, 9, is adjusting to his new life in the small town of Tegucigalpa.

“I was scared to come here,” he shared in an interview with Univision.

Lara was a student at Torrance Elementary School whose detainment sparked outrage from teachers and community members who knew the boy.

On May 29, he attended an immigration hearing in downtown Los Angeles with his father, Martir Garcia-Banegas, 50.

Instead of receiving an update on their immigration status, the boy and his father were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). After a short separation, the next day, they were transferred to an immigration facility in Texas with plans to deport them to Honduras.

ICE officials said on July 10, 2021, the boy and his father left their hometown and illegally entered the U.S. On Sept. 1, 2022, an immigration judge ordered the pair to return to Honduras. Garcia-Banegas appealed the decision, but on Aug. 11, 2023, the appeal was dismissed.

However, the boy and his father did not leave the country as ordered and during the immigration hearing in downtown L.A., they were detained, ICE said.

News of the boy’s detainment had teachers and community members rallying together to find a way to help the pair stay in the country. Lara had been a student at Torrance Elementary since the first grade.

However, federal officials said the father and son had “exhausted due process and have no legal remedies left to pursue.”

Just days ago, they landed in Honduras. The 9-year-old said he misses his life in Torrance and is working to adjust to his new reality.

“I want to see my friends again,” Lara said. “I miss all my friends.”

The boy’s father said he hopes his case will be reconsidered in the future. In the meantime, he is working to provide for his son the best he can.

“They’re being cruel to people,” Garcia-Banegas said about the ICE raids in Los Angeles. “All of it — it’s inhumane.”

Federal immigration authorities have deported a 9-year-old Torrance Elementary School student and his father to Honduras after the pair showed up for a routine immigration hearing last month.

Mártir García-Banegas, 50, and his son, Mártir García Lara, are in the capital of Honduras, reeling from their removal of their lives in the United States.

“I was scared to be here and I wanted to be with my sister,” García Lara told a Univision reporter in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

His father arrived in the United States on July 10, 2021. He and his son were undocumented. An immigration judge ordered both the father and son to be deported to Honduras on Sept. 1, 2022, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The father appealed the decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals on Aug. 11, 2023, but the appeal was dismissed. The two did not leave the country as ordered by the immigration judge.

Before his last court hearing in the United States, García-Banegas said he got the impression that something was going to happen that day.

“I have a feeling they’re going to deport me. I can’t leave my son,” he told Univision. “I’m going to take him with me. I got up early that morning, took a shower and everything to get ready.”

California

June 10, 2025

On May 29, the boy and his father were detained at a federal courthouse in Los Angeles. The two were then transferred the following day to a federal immigration facility in Dilley, Texas, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson.

“They are being cruel to people,” García-Banegas said about the treatment of undocumented people by the U.S. government. “Right now, people are behaving. If you look, you see things that are not [humane] things.”

Before it was clear what exactly happened to the boy and his father, the Torrance community scrambled to find answers. Members of the Torrance Elementary School PTA asked local officials for support to return the boy home.

García Lara has attended the school since he was in the first grade.

“I want to see my friends again, who are everything to me,” the boy told Univision.

For days, parents and community members only had partial information about the boy’s whereabouts.

“We’re all searching for answers,” Torrance Elementary PTA volunteer Ria Villanueva told The Times before it was revealed that García-Banegas and his son would be deported. “When something like this happens, it shakes all of us in the community. There’s not a child at our school that we don’t treat as our own.”

García-Banegas has an older son, who is about to graduate from high school in Los Angeles. His son Kevin arrived in California from Honduras about nine months after his father and younger brother.

García-Banegas and his younger son will remain in Honduras, but Kevin remains in the United States with his aunt, according to reporting from Univision. He recently applied for a juvenile visa with the help from an immigration attorney.

“It hurts that Kevin stayed there and he’s already grown up, but it hurts all of me,” the father said.

The South Bay student was detained, along with his father, during an immigration hearing on May 29, according to federal authorities.

Posted Thu, Jun 5, 2025 at 11:21 am PT

TORRANCE, CA — A South Bay student who was detained by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, along with his father, last month, is expected to be deported, according to federal authorities.

The nine-year-old boy, Martir Garcia, traveled with his father to Houston, Texas, for an immigration hearing last month. They were expecting an update on his father's immigration status, but they were detained and separated instead, according to the report.

An ICE spokesperson told Patch that Garcia and his father, traveling from Honduras, entered the U.S. illegally on July 10, 2021. After an immigration judge ordered the nine-year-old and his father to be deported in 2022, they appealed the decision, according to ICE.

RELATED: ICE Officials Criticized For Using Flash Bombs On Crowd During SoCal Restaurant Raids

The Board of Immigration Appeals, however, dismissed their plea, according to ICE.

Find out what's happening in Redondo Beachfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

"The family unit failed to leave the U.S. as instructed by the immigration judge's order," the ICE spokesperson told Patch, adding that they were taken into custody on May 29. "They exhausted due process and (have) no legal remedies left to pursue."

The family unit is currently at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Dilley, Texas, "pending removal to Honduras," an ICE spokesperson said.

RELATED: ICE Targets Bay Area Immigration Courts, Multiple Arrests Made

The nine-year-old was living in Southern California and attending Torrance Elementary School before being detained.

His detention alarmed his teachers, who reached out to the school's PTA to rally support for the child. PTA and community members have since been lobbying for help from federal, state and local leaders to free the boy, The Hill reported.

“We remain committed to the safety and well-being of all our students and will continue to follow proper protocols as more information becomes available,” the Torrance Unified School District announced in a statement to The Independent.

Angelica Zacarías, a local mother, told Univision that she is concerned about the lasting impacts this will have on the fourth-grader

"Psychologically, he's damaged for life; these are memories that you don't forget," she said in Spanish. "It's horrible that the government is acting like this against immigrants because we are all immigrants."

Antonio Sánchez, who has been friends with the nine-year-old's father for seven years, told Univision in a Spanish language interview that local parents have been trying to show support and want to speak with their friend, but haven't been allowed to.

"We've talked with immigration, but they say they don't have any information — to see if they're going to let him go," Sánchez told Univision.

According to CNN, Federal authorities have detained about 500 children since President Donald Trump took office.

A 4-year-old Mexican girl who receives lifesaving medical care from a Southern California hospital was granted permission to remain in the country weeks after federal authorities said she could be deported, her family's attorneys said Tuesday.

The girl’s family said they were notified in April and May that their humanitarian parole was being revoked and they would be subject to potential deportation. They said the child likely could not survive if she were deported.

Her case was one of several humanitarian parolees granted temporary legal status under former President Joe Biden that the Trump Administration is revoking.

ICE added that the U.S. government is offering anyone living in the country illegally $1,000 and a free flight to self-deport through the Customs and Border Protection app.

"We encourage every person here illegally to take advantage of this offer and reserve the chance to come back to the U.S. the right legal way to live American dream (sic)," a spokesperson with ICE said. "If not, you will be arrested and deported without a chance to return."