A Kodiak man has been arrested and charged with a felony for allegedly impersonating an Immigration and Customs Enforcement Officer and harassing employees at the local Walmart and Safeway for “their papers.”
The incident comes amid a deployment of masked, un-uniformed federal agents nationwide as part of President Donald Trump’s mass-deportation campaign. That campaign has resulted in thousands of people being detained. People protesting the federal government’s actions have been killed and injured.
The Kodiak Daily Mirror first reported the charge facing Maximillian I. Kaplan, who was arrested Wednesday after a Walmart employee reported that a white man in his 30s, wearing black, “came into the store yelling at cashiers and customers for their papers, saying he was from ICE and that he almost got into a fight with someone outside,” according to an affidavit submitted to Kodiak District Court by Detective Jeffrey Valerio of the Kodiak Police Department.
Before police responded, they received another call from a manager at the nearby Safeway store, who said a similar looking man “came into the store and was very disruptive to customers.”
When police found Kaplan, he said that God told him to ask the employees for their papers.
Kaplan confirmed that he told the employees that he was with ICE and that he had asked them for their papers, Valerio wrote. When he asked Kaplan why he said he was with ICE, Kaplan replied, “because I am.”
Online court records show Kaplan is facing a charge of “impersonating a public servant,” a Class C felony, the lowest-level felony. In Alaska, that’s punishable by up to five years in prison and a $50,000 fine. First-time offenders, particularly for nonviolent crimes, may receive probation and no jail time.
In a preliminary hearing on Thursday, Assistant District Attorney Todd Shaker noted that the officer observed that Kaplan was wearing black with a backpack.
“As we know, some ICE agent(s) aren’t uniformed,” Shaker said, according to the log notes of the hearing.
Kaplan asked to represent himself in court, and in a hearing on Monday, said he doesn’t trust the public defender’s office.
“I think this is all a political thing. They are setting me up to fail,” he said, according to log notes of the hearing. “I think it is because I am a tall white male. I think they hate me.”
Magistrate Judge Dawson Williams, presiding over the hearing, appointed a defense attorney from the Office of Public Advocacy to represent Kaplan.
“I wish it would work out here in this town, but I feel like this town is against me,” Kaplan said, according to the hearing’s log notes. “I’ve been kicked out of almost every store.”
A preliminary hearing in the case has been scheduled for Feb. 11.