Biography
Emily Heather Phillips was arrested across the street from Cities Church in Saint Paul on Easter Sunday, April 5, 2026, during an anti-ICE demonstration. Protesters targeted the church because one of its pastors, David Easterwood, was also the acting director of ICE’s Saint Paul field office. Police accused Phillips of disrupting the service after warnings about amplified sound; Phillips and her lawyer said she had turned off the equipment and was speaking with her unamplified voice on public property. She spent the night in Ramsey County Jail. At her April 6 appearance, Ramsey County District Judge Maria Mitchel found no probable cause, dismissed all four misdemeanor counts, and ordered her release.
Sources
- Minnesota Star Tribune — arrest, overnight detention, charges, and April 6 dismissal
- Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder — Ramsey County Jail release and Phillips’s account
- CBS Minnesota — April 5 arrest and April 6 court ruling
Portrait provenance
The booking photograph is cropped from the left image explicitly identified as Emily Heather Phillips in an April 6, 2026 Crime Watch MN report published by Alpha News. Original booking photographer unspecified. Original-pixel crop excludes the adjacent protest scene and divider while retaining her full head and hair; no retouching, enlargement, or generated details. A booking photograph does not establish a conviction: the charges in this case were dismissed. Source political characterizations are not adopted; existing case details are unchanged.
