ICE agent fatally shoots motorist during traffic stop in Houston | ICE (US Immigration and Customs Enforcement)
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said a federal immigration agent shot and killed a driver in Houston on Tuesday morning.
According to ICE, agents stopped Lorenzo Salgado Araujo around 6:50 a.m. and attempted to arrest him. Salgado described Araujo as a Mexican citizen and an “illegal alien” the agency was seeking as part of a “targeted enforcement operation.”
His son, Ronaldo Salgado, told Telemundo Houston that his father went out that morning to look for workers in the area. According to ICE, Salgado Araujo “armed his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer.” The shooting resulted in “our officer firing his weapon in self-defense.”
The FBI will take over the investigation of the case, the agency said.
ICE did not provide any evidence to substantiate its statement, which echoed accounts of other ICE attacks, including the killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis and the shooting of two Venezuelan men in Oregon earlier this year. In these cases, government accounts of the incident were later contradicted by video evidence. In April, the federal government announced that a California man who opened fire at a traffic stop “used a gun on his vehicle” but that his car did not hit any police officers.
Salgado Araujo was shot in the abdomen and taken to a hospital, where he died, according to local law enforcement.
The Texas Civil Rights Project condemned ICE’s use of force and raised questions about the agency’s account of the shooting. “We demand full transparency, an independent investigation into the shooting and any use of racial profiling that led to it, and accountability for the use of deadly force. Our neighborhoods are not battlegrounds,” said Rochelle Garza, president of the civil rights group.
U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia of Houston echoed that demand, saying Salgado Araujo’s family and constituents “deserve a complete and transparent explanation” for the shooting. “All available footage, communications and other evidence must be preserved and reviewed as part of a full and impartial investigation,” he said.
Local reporters and eyewitnesses recorded video of the attack, but the Guardian has yet to verify the source and content.
Reuters contributed reporting
