The 911 call came in at 6:32 a.m. on Thursday: Two “suspicious” men wearing dark clothing were lingering inside a Columbia University residential building.
But when New York Police Department officers were dispatched to the scene, they came across U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents in the midst of an unusually elaborate operation.
According to a statement later released by Columbia, the agents had gained access to the building by posing as police in search of a 5-year-old — going so far as to present a flyer of the “missing child” to a campus safety officer.
The ruse allowed them to make their way to the apartment of Ellie Aghayeva, an international student from Azerbaijan who immigration officials claim overstayed her visa. The NYPD officers arrived after the men had entered her apartment, a department spokesperson said. They confirmed the men were federal agents, then quickly left the building.
The arrest has prompted widespread censure and calls for investigation by Democrats, as well as a surprising intervention by President Donald Trump. The Republican informed New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani that Aghayeva was being released shortly after meeting with the Democratic mayor Thursday.
As new details emerge, the operation has also threatened to open a rift between the city’s police department and ICE, whose agents have increasingly donned the disguises of utility workers, delivery drivers and other uniformed professionals to carry out Trump’s sweeping deportation campaign.
While such tactics are not illegal, former police officers said the apparent misrepresentation at Columbia represented a startling escalation, one that could gravely undermine public trust during the next emergency.
“If the police are actually looking for a child in danger, people are now going to be more hesitant to help,” said Michael Alcazar, a retired hostage negotiator with the NYPD. “Almost immediately, this sort of ICE subterfuge is going to make the job of police officers more difficult.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, Tricia McLaughlin, has disputed portions of the university’s narrative, claiming the federal agents “verbally identified themselves and visibly wore badges around their necks” and were allowed into the building by a property manager.
McLaughlin did not respond to repeated questions about whether the agents had used the guise of a missing child to enter the apartment.
Claire Shipman, the university’s acting president, said on Thursday that security cameras had “captured the agents in the hallway showing pictures of the alleged missing child,” adding that the situation was “utterly unacceptable.”
Columbia has so far declined to release that footage.
The NYPD also declined to share body camera footage of their response. A department spokesperson said the officers had followed the law by not interfering in an active federal investigation.
Aghayeva’s arrest has prompted protests at Columbia, along with fear and confusion.
Her friends said that she was in her final semester on an international student visa, studying neuroscience and politics. In an emergency petition filed Thursday, her attorneys wrote she was not given a reason for the arrest.
A spokesperson for DHS said Aghayeva’s visa had been terminated in 2016 for failing to attend classes. She remains in removal proceedings despite her release, the spokesperson said.
Jeffrey Fagan, a law professor at Columbia who studies policing, said research has shown that deceptive tactics by police are especially likely to hurt law enforcement legitimacy when they resulted in an arrest “perceived to be unjustified.”
“Anybody looking at this is going to immediately think it’s unjustified,” he said. “So that will erode trust in a relevant community the next time officers need cooperation.”
Peter Moskos, a professor of criminal justice at John Jay University and former Baltimore City police officer, agreed. He noted that sanctuary policies were originally meant to enhance public safety by building trust between immigrant communities and police.
“The idea is that you would trust the cops and call the cops when you need them and know you wouldn’t be deported,” he said. “But ICE seems to be doing everything they can to break down trust.”
