Immigration operation standoff at a Lake Worth Beach bakery inflames community tensions
By Jake Shore
July 10, 2026 at 12:19 PM EDT
Roiling community frustration over heavy immigration enforcement in Lake Worth Beach bubbled to the surface on Thursday, as dozens of residents protested federal agents and Florida state troopers who swarmed a local bakery to arrest a single man.
Outside the bakery, Florida Highway Patrol Captain Ryan Martina declined to answer questions about the incident but did confirm a few details to WLRN. He said troopers served as “backup” to U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE), who tried to pull over a man named “Jacob” on Thursday morning. He was later identified as Jacob Zapeta Castro.
Troopers said Zapeta Castro fled into the Guatemalan bakery called El Quetzal on Lucerne Avenue, which he owns, and locked the doors. Between 25 and 30 officers and agents surrounded the bakery for hours.
READ MORE: Why Palm Beach County leads Florida in arrests of suspected undocumented immigrants
One trooper on the scene claimed Zapeta Castro had an “extensive criminal history,” but named only the federal offense of re-entering the country after previously being deported. Mariana Blanco, of the Guatemalan Maya Center, said Zapeta Castro had a valid work permit and driver’s license.
Through the hot July afternoon, approximately fifty people watched from outside a police cordon. Many recorded the happenings on their phones — while some shouted at the officers, who they accused of harassing Latino residents and separating families.
Florida Highway Patrol troopers mingle with Palm Beach County Sheriff's office, who are helping to secure a standoff initiated by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement traffic stop on July 9, 2026. (4032x3024, AR: 1.3333333333333333)
“I want you to go home and think about all these little kids crying for their father,” one woman shouted. Others shouted “shame” at them.
Zapeta Castro’s teenage children were in the crowd. They sobbed loudly, as their father stood at the window waving at them, before being detained.
The incident highlights growing community tensions as the Trump administration has reportedly pressed ICE to increase arrest rates, resulting in at least 10,000 immigrants detained nationwide over just five days at the end of June.
Over the past week in and around Lake Worth, there’s been a marked surge in immigration traffic stops by state troopers and ICE, according to activists and community leaders.
FHP has been a willing collaborator with the administration’s immigration agenda, using traffic stops on state highways as the top of the funnel for detaining undocumented immigrants. The agency has appeared to aim its focus at Lake Worth and Palm Beach County, as WLRN previously reported, which is the home city and county of agency director, Dave Kerner.
‘Do the right thing’
On the sweltering afternoon, troopers and Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputies guarded the bakery, stone-faced. Traffic slowed to a crawl on the two-lane road outside, with rubber-necking drivers recording the operation on their phones.
Residents filming the operation crossed the road back-and-forth to get better vantage points, while officers used their cars to block off the scene.
The only interruption would come when the Brightline train sped through the train tracks separating observers and police.
Some troopers came out to the crowd to talk to community figures like Blanco and Father Frank O'Loughlin.
Florida Highway Patrol troopers, including a captain, talk to community advocate and priest, Father Frank O'Loughlin. He has spent decades advocating for the Guatemalan diaspora in Palm Beach County and tried to negotiate a peace between officers and the man locked inside the bakery during the tense immigration operation on July 9, 2026. (5712x4284, AR: 1.3333333333333333)
The troopers oscillated between negotiating with them to coax Zapeta Castro out of the building and threatening to break down the door with a judicial warrant — and detain more immigrants.
“He can do the right thing and come out, or when we come in there, now we come in contact with people that are potentially harboring a fugitive and everyone will be identified,” said the officer, who identified himself only as Trooper Baez.
Baez said that when Zapeta Castro went into the bakery, he left his 13-and-15-year-old children in the car.
According to Blanco, when advocates first arrived at the bakery in the late morning, ICE and FHP were questioning the teens and seemed to be using them as collateral to get Zapeta Castro to come out.
WLRN interviewed one of Zapeta Castro’s family members, an 18-year-old man entering the military. He spoke on the condition of anonymity to not endanger his planned military service.
He said he arrived with advocates only to find Zapeta Castro’s children, his cousins, being questioned.
“They probably felt scared. I mean, at that age, I'm pretty sure you're supposed to be thinking about school, going to soccer, stuff like that, and they're over here getting asked questions by grown men,” he said.
A child of undocumented immigrants himself, the 18-year-old said he’s proud to begin serving his country in the next few months.
But he questioned ICE and state police’s gargantuan efforts to arrest one single person — his family member, who he described as a hardworking man.
“They call themselves patriots, stuff like that. I'm pretty sure they're not serving their country,” he said, “They're not, they're really not.”
Outside the bakery, Florida Highway Patrol Captain Ryan Martina declined to answer questions about the incident but did confirm a few details to WLRN. He said troopers served as “backup” to U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE), who tried to pull over a man named “Jacob” on Thursday morning. He was later identified as Jacob Zapeta Castro.
Troopers said Zapeta Castro fled into the Guatemalan bakery called El Quetzal on Lucerne Avenue, which he owns, and locked the doors. Between 25 and 30 officers and agents surrounded the bakery for hours.
READ MORE: Why Palm Beach County leads Florida in arrests of suspected undocumented immigrants
One trooper on the scene claimed Zapeta Castro had an “extensive criminal history,” but named only the federal offense of re-entering the country after previously being deported. Mariana Blanco, of the Guatemalan Maya Center, said Zapeta Castro had a valid work permit and driver’s license.
Through the hot July afternoon, approximately fifty people watched from outside a police cordon. Many recorded the happenings on their phones — while some shouted at the officers, who they accused of harassing Latino residents and separating families.
Florida Highway Patrol troopers mingle with Palm Beach County Sheriff's office, who are helping to secure a standoff initiated by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement traffic stop on July 9, 2026. (4032x3024, AR: 1.3333333333333333)
“I want you to go home and think about all these little kids crying for their father,” one woman shouted. Others shouted “shame” at them.
Zapeta Castro’s teenage children were in the crowd. They sobbed loudly, as their father stood at the window waving at them, before being detained.
The incident highlights growing community tensions as the Trump administration has reportedly pressed ICE to increase arrest rates, resulting in at least 10,000 immigrants detained nationwide over just five days at the end of June.
Over the past week in and around Lake Worth, there’s been a marked surge in immigration traffic stops by state troopers and ICE, according to activists and community leaders.
FHP has been a willing collaborator with the administration’s immigration agenda, using traffic stops on state highways as the top of the funnel for detaining undocumented immigrants. The agency has appeared to aim its focus at Lake Worth and Palm Beach County, as WLRN previously reported, which is the home city and county of agency director, Dave Kerner.
‘Do the right thing’
On the sweltering afternoon, troopers and Palm Beach County Sheriff’s deputies guarded the bakery, stone-faced. Traffic slowed to a crawl on the two-lane road outside, with rubber-necking drivers recording the operation on their phones.
Residents filming the operation crossed the road back-and-forth to get better vantage points, while officers used their cars to block off the scene.
The only interruption would come when the Brightline train sped through the train tracks separating observers and police.
Some troopers came out to the crowd to talk to community figures like Blanco and Father Frank O'Loughlin.
Florida Highway Patrol troopers, including a captain, talk to community advocate and priest, Father Frank O'Loughlin. He has spent decades advocating for the Guatemalan diaspora in Palm Beach County and tried to negotiate a peace between officers and the man locked inside the bakery during the tense immigration operation on July 9, 2026. (5712x4284, AR: 1.3333333333333333)
The troopers oscillated between negotiating with them to coax Zapeta Castro out of the building and threatening to break down the door with a judicial warrant — and detain more immigrants.
“He can do the right thing and come out, or when we come in there, now we come in contact with people that are potentially harboring a fugitive and everyone will be identified,” said the officer, who identified himself only as Trooper Baez.
Baez said that when Zapeta Castro went into the bakery, he left his 13-and-15-year-old children in the car.
According to Blanco, when advocates first arrived at the bakery in the late morning, ICE and FHP were questioning the teens and seemed to be using them as collateral to get Zapeta Castro to come out.
WLRN interviewed one of Zapeta Castro’s family members, an 18-year-old man entering the military. He spoke on the condition of anonymity to not endanger his planned military service.
He said he arrived with advocates only to find Zapeta Castro’s children, his cousins, being questioned.
“They probably felt scared. I mean, at that age, I'm pretty sure you're supposed to be thinking about school, going to soccer, stuff like that, and they're over here getting asked questions by grown men,” he said.
A child of undocumented immigrants himself, the 18-year-old said he’s proud to begin serving his country in the next few months.
But he questioned ICE and state police’s gargantuan efforts to arrest one single person — his family member, who he described as a hardworking man.
“They call themselves patriots, stuff like that. I'm pretty sure they're not serving their country,” he said, “They're not, they're really not.”