The agent’s troubles began on June 17 when he was one of a team that took part in an immigration raid outside of a large outdoor retail park in Pico Rivera, which turned ugly when Adrian Martinez, a Walmart worker on his lunch break, intervened to try to prevent the detention of a janitor, resulting in a brawl in which Martinez, 20, was overpowered by multiple officers, thrown in the back of a truck and taken away.
“He’s a f***ing legal citizen you f***ing pieces of s***!” someone can be heard screaming in the viral footage, filmed at the scene by a bystander, in which Hodgson was the only agent involved whose face was visible because he wore no mask.
The video was subsequently posted by U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, who
said Martinez was “arrested for an allegation of punching a Border Patrol agent in the face after he attempted to impede their immigration enforcement operation,” urging people not to follow his example.
Border Patrol Chief Patrol Agent Greg Bovino
also posted the video, saying “a false narrative is and was being pushed out” about the incident, echoing Essayli’s stance on it and attempting to quell outrage over Martinez’s treatment.
The Walmart employee was ultimately held for three days in a downtown Los Angeles detention facility, despite his mother arriving and presenting his birth certificate to prove his nationality, before being released on a $5,000 bond and a single charge of conspiracy to impede or injure a federal agent.
Martinez has since
lost his job but has said he has no regrets about trying to “speak up for a man that couldn’t speak up for himself.” He and his attorneys are fighting the federal criminal charge.
Then, on July 7, Hodgson was arrested himself after allegedly wandering drunkenly into the women’s restroom of the Yard House restaurant on Long Beach’s Shoreline Village waterfront wearing a gun and an ammunition clip, despite being off-duty, and asking a female customer out on a date.
After a security guard called 911 in response to her complaint about his behaviour, Hodgson left the restaurant and was seen pacing the restaurant's parking lot while armed, hiding his weapon behind a palm tree when police officers arrived to investigate.
When Hodgson failed to respond to their commands to put his hands up, a 90-second struggle ensued in which he was ultimately Tasered, brought down, and handcuffed.
The L.A. County District Attorney’s Office said in a subsequent statement: “When [the officers] arrived, they reportedly observed Hodgson intoxicated and unwilling to cooperate with their commands as they tried to detain him. As Hodgson resisted arrest, he allegedly became agitated and physical with the officers, injuring one of them.”
In body camera footage subsequently
obtained by The Long Beach Post, Hodgson can be seen complaining in custody shortly afterwards that he has “already dealt with so much f*****g stress and all this b*****t, man.”
He goes on to imply that he believes his family has been doxed because of his job and says, “I’ve made more than one f*****g mistake. Everyone just f*****g hates me here… People are after me here in Los Angeles.”
After his release on July 9, the DA’s Office charged him with three felony counts of resisting arrest, one felony count of battery on an officer, and three misdemeanor gun charges to which he pleaded not guilty.
He faced up to seven years in prison had he been convicted of those offences, but a month later, he passed away, and they are now expected to be dismissed.
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