HOUSTON — Three men inside a van who witnessed the fatal shooting of the driver by an immigration officer in Houston said the Mexican man was shot through a passenger window and that the officer was never threatened, a lawyer who has spoken with them said Friday.
The shooting Tuesday during an attempted traffic stop by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in Houston has revived critical voices deriding the Trump administration's immigration crackdown and how ICE operates. Immigration arrests around the country recently surged to 10,000 over a five-day period, fueled in part by massive Congressional funding.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has released no evidence to support the officer's story that Lorenzo Salgado Araujo ignored their commands and rammed into an ICE vehicle with his white van, or that the officer fired in self-defense.
Authorities have said Salgado Araujo was not the person ICE was trying to find.
The officers were not wearing body cameras and neither ICE nor DHS have released photos, videos or other evidence from the scene.
The men tell an attorney that the ICE story is untrue
Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old homebuilder who was shot and killed as he drove his crew to a construction site. His family said he had lived in the U.S. for more than 35 years, had no criminal record and was close to finishing the long process of obtaining legal status when he was killed.
ICE detained the other three men in the van and they all told a lawyer that no officer was in front of the van or even in danger.
“After speaking with these men, I have no doubt that what they’re saying is the truth. I know that these agents — the agency — is going to try to cover it up,” attorney Hugo Balderas-Ibarra said during a news conference.
Images of the van after the shooting appear to show no damage, he said.
ICE has not released the names of the detained men, but family members said they have been able to briefly talk with them. Salgado Araujo's brother was among those arrested.
Democratic U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia said it was unsurprising that Salgado Araujo drove off when ICE tried to stop his vehicle, given that their vehicles were unmarked and had no lights.
“What would you do if you were being followed by someone and the cars were unmarked?” Garcia said.
The detained men say ICE is pressuring them to self-deport
ICE is pressuring the men to self-deport which would make it harder for them to share their version of events with investigators or others, said Juana Degollado, who said her stepfather Daniel Tirado Pantoja is among the detained men. She said he has no legal permission to live in the U.S. but has no criminal record.
“It is extremely important that we preserve the integrity of this investigation,” Balderas-Ibarra said. “That will all be out the window if they are deported.”
DHS said allegations that the men have been pressured to leave the country are “categorically false.”
Garcia has said Salgado Araujo was not even the man ICE was looking for.
DHS said Thursday that officers investigating a tip weeks earlier saw two white vans at the address of a target. While heading to that address Tuesday, officers saw a white van and someone inside who resembled the person they were looking for, the department said in a statement.
Garcia said the acting director of ICE told her officers thought someone in the van, but not Salgado Araujo or his brother, had a final order of removal but did not share a name,
“No one in that van had warrants or any legal problem,” Degollado told the AP in a text message.
ICE refuses to release officer's name or other information
DHS said it will not release the officer’s name because they could face threats and violence and their family could be at risk.
DHS also has not responded to requests for other information, including how long the officer has worked for ICE or whether anyone involved in the shooting is administrative leave. The department has taken a similar stance after previous fatal shootings involving its officers. Many local and state law enforcement agencies routinely identify and provide biographical details about officers involved in critical incidents.
Unlike some previous deaths involving federal immigration officers, few photos or videos surrounding the shooting have emerged publicly in the days since Salgado Araujo's death.
The League of United Latin American Citizens offered a $5,000 reward for video or other evidence but the positions of the vehicles means surveillance cameras in the area were blocked from recording the shooting, CEO Juan Proaño said.
Local prosecutors are talking to witnesses
Local prosecutors were not invited into the investigation by federal officials but have spent the past three days in the Houston neighborhood looking for surveillance footage and talking to witnesses, Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare said.
Teare said anyone with video or other information must share it with his office so the truth about the shooting can be determined.
“We will go to the ends of the earth to collect all the evidence, so that we can eventually let the public know what happened,” Teare said.
Salgado Araujo's family said they found out he was dead through the ICE statement instead of directly from the agency. Garcia said officers kept his belongings and sent him to the hospital where he died without including his name.
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Brook reported from New Orleans and Foley from Iowa City, Iowa. Associated Press reporters Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas; Rebecca Santana in Washington, D.C.; and Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed.