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- On the last day of a Carnival cruise, a couple was woken up by armed Customs and Border Protection agents.
- Her husband, a U.S. citizen and Coast Guard veteran, was handcuffed and detained in a mistaken identity incident.
- The couple claims officers forced them to delete video footage of the incident from their cellphones.
On the last morning of their cruise, Jose “Joey” Martinez and Tamara “Tammy” Barjas received an unexpected wake-up call.
Just before 7 a.m. on January 5, they heard a bang on the cabin door aboard the Carnival Horizon, where Martinez and a friend were on a Caribbean cruise for their 50th birthdays.
“Right away the door opened and a flashlight came into the room,” Varjas, 44, told USA TODAY. “Three large men dressed in black and armed were pointing flashlights at us and shouting.”
The Phoenix-based couple was half-clothed, she said. Verjas began filming as Customs and Border Protection agents handcuffed Martinez, who he said is a U.S. citizen and Coast Guard veteran.
“A female agent came in and jumped on top of me on the bed and tried to snatch my phone, which she ended up doing,” Varjas recalled. “Then they disappeared for 90 minutes, taking Joey and my cellphone.” The couple said the man was taken into custody at the Port of Miami.
They said authorities only explained after their release that they were actually looking for another person with Martinez’s name.
“I mean, we were in shock,” Martinez said. “It was shocking. You know, (it was) something we never expected to happen.”
Carnival Cruise Line told USA TODAY the cruise line was “not involved in this investigation or action.”
“We are aware that U.S. Customs and Border Protection has detained a guest as a person of interest,” the company said in an email. “As this is a law enforcement matter, we will refer all further questions to the appropriate authorities.”
The couple said they have not received an apology from CBP or any communication from Carnival since the incident. Officers also allegedly forced the couple to delete the footage from Beljas’ cell phone before agreeing to return it.
CBP has not yet commented on USA TODAY’s request. The couple’s testimony comes amid other reports of Americans and foreign tourists being detained as the Trump administration ramps up its crackdown on people without legal status.
Martinez and Beljas say they don’t plan to fly for at least the next three years. “So all they had to do was a little homework and they would have cleared him,” Beljas said.
Nathan Diller is a consumer travel reporter for USA TODAY based in Nashville. Please contact us at ndiller@usatoday.com.
