LOS ANGELES - A man from the Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles has been sentenced to 37 months in federal prison for throwing rocks and ignited debris at California Highway Patrol (CHP) officers trapped underneath a downtown Los Angeles freeway overpass - with a CHP vehicle set ablaze during a violent anti-immigration law enforcement protest last year, the Justice Department announced today.

Ismael Vega, 42, was sentenced on Monday by United States District Judge John F. Walter, who also ordered him to pay $253,415 in restitution.

Vega pleaded guilty on April 29 to one count of obstructing, impeding, and interfering with law enforcement during a civil disorder.

According to his plea agreement, during the evening of June 8, 2025, two days after violence erupted against federal agents enforcing U.S. immigration laws, Vega was part of a large group of protesters on the Main Street overpass above U.S. Highway 101 in downtown Los Angeles. These protesters picked up debris - including cardboard and vegetation - and fireworks, lit them on fire and dropped them over the freeway overpass's railing, aiming for a nearby CHP vehicle, which was within feet of CHP officers trapped underneath the overpass.

Vega admitted in his plea agreement that he knew the officers were under the freeway overpass and that the objects thrown and burning debris dropped onto a vehicle created a substantial risk of death or serious bodily injury to the officers.

Multiple times, Vega attempted to help other individuals who were trying to light debris on fire on the 101 Freeway overpass. He lit a large piece of cardboard on fire, held it over the railing to line it up to land on the hood of a CHP vehicle, which it did after he dropped it. Then, as another individual - co-defendant Yachua Mauricio Flores, 23, of Lincoln Heights - poured a liquid increasing the size of the flames, Vega was next to co-defendant Flores and used his hands to motion towards and gesture at the flames.

Vega also picked up and threw multiple rocks at law enforcement officers as these officers attempted to clear the overpass. He further admitted that he knowingly engaged in that behavior intending that it obstruct, impede, and interfere with the law enforcement officers and their duties.

"This civil disorder stood apart in its magnitude," prosecutors argued in a sentencing memorandum. "A sergeant in the California Highway Patrol with nearly three decades in law enforcement wrote a statement about how this incident stood apart and the impact it had on him and his son. His experience underscores how violent this incident became and the deep toll it took on all law enforcement present."

Vega is the fifth defendant sentenced in connection with this case. Flores faces a statutory maximum sentence of five years in federal prison at his August 3 sentencing hearing. The case's lead defendant, Adam Charles Palermo, 40, of Rampart Village, has a December 14 sentencing hearing scheduled, at which time he will face a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison.

The FBI, with assistance from CHP and the Los Angeles Police Department, investigated this matter.

Assistant United States Attorneys Jenna W. Long and Lana Morton Owens of the National Security Division, and Assistant United States Attorney Sebastian Bellm of the General Crimes Section prosecuted this case.