He Refused to Pay the Crew That Built His Fence and Mentioned ICE. They Came Back and Took the Fence.
A homeowner in Joliet, Illinois, hired Diaz Fence Company to put up a wooden privacy fence, then allegedly refused to pay when the job was done and brought up ICE. Hours later the crew came back and took the entire fence apart, post by post, while he yelled at them from the yard.
Owner César Diaz filmed the whole thing. Since Saturday it has been everywhere, and Aaron Parnas’s recap of it on TikTok has 3.7 million views on its own.
@aaronparnas1 #greenscreenvideo 9/14
Parnas’s video has 3.7 million views, 611,000 likes, and 29,500 comments since Monday morning.
What’s in the video
Diaz posted the original footage to Instagram under @el.compa.cesar on September 13. It shows his crew back at the property, moving fast. Panels come off. Posts come out of the ground. The fence that took a full day to build is gone in a fraction of that.
The homeowner, who hasn’t been named, is audible the whole time. He tells them to get off his property, with an expletive in the middle, and threatens to call the police. One of the workers can be heard saying this isn’t what they wanted to do.
In his caption, Diaz wrote that the homeowner refused to pay once the job was finished. His read on why: maybe the guy thought he could call ICE on them, or assumed they were immigrants. Diaz also alleged the homeowner took his chainsaw during the confrontation.
One detail that gets a lot of love in the comments: the video is set to AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck.”
What we know and what we don’t
Diaz’s account is the only one on record. The homeowner hasn’t spoken publicly, and nobody has confirmed whether ICE was actually contacted or just threatened. What’s on video is a crew removing a fence and a man shouting at them to stop.
Parnas, a lawyer with 5.5 million followers who has become one of TikTok’s biggest news accounts, summed it up with an on-screen headline: Illinois man hires Hispanic workers to build a fence, refuses to pay and threatens them, they come back and take it apart piece by piece.
The comments want to hire these guys
The overwhelming reaction under Parnas’s video was not outrage. It was people asking for the company’s number, because the fence looked good.
> “Ok, but what’s their business name cause that fence was CLEAN” (@boofus88)
> “I live in Illinois and would like to know the name of that company because what a frickin beautiful fence!” (@unplugged2021)
> “They repo’d that fence” (@rubacita)
> “Call the police?! You didn’t pay for the fence, therefore they can take it back.” (@charsweb63)
Contractors showed up to say this is not rare:
> “As a construction business owner this happens a lot especially because they think all Hispanics are illegal…… little do they know they’re not and IM NOT!” (@healthierstrongeru)
And one commenter, @havetodoitalloveragain, shared a story about a neighbor who stiffed a tree crew and woke up to four times as many logs blocking his driveway with a sign that said “pay your bill.”
Can you actually repo a fence?
This is where the lawyers in the comments split. The common-sense take, that you don’t own what you didn’t pay for, is not quite how property law works once something is attached to land. Several people warned that ripping out an installed fence could be treated as trespass or property damage, and that the safer route is a mechanics lien and small claims court.
The counterargument is that a lien takes months, a lawyer costs money, and a small fence crew that just ate a full day of labor and materials doesn’t have either. Diaz took the fastest route to being made whole and got a video that will bring him more business than the job was worth.
The ICE angle is what turned a contractor dispute into a national story. Using immigration status, real or assumed, as leverage to avoid paying for work is a pattern Latino contractors describe constantly. This time the crew had their paperwork, a camera, and a Sawzall.
Workers getting harassed for doing their job in someone else’s neighborhood is a genre at this point. Earlier this year a door-to-door worker filmed a woman following her to every house she knocked on. And if you want a very different look at what a day of labor is worth, a DoorDash driver accepted every order for 12 hours and made $215.
The homeowner, meanwhile, has no fence, a viral video, and a reputation in Joliet. The crew has their materials back. Everyone in the comments has a new fence company.
For more stories like this, check out our Labor section.
