Protest And Vigil Held For Mexican Immigrant Killed By ICE Officer During Attempted Traffic Stop Arrest
Source: Brandon Bell / Getty

As the killing of Mexican immigrant Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by an ICE agent in Houston continues to draw not just nationwide attention, but attention from across the border as well, witnesses to the shooting are disputing the government’s account of how events unfolded, and the Department of Homeland Security is now saying Salgado Araujo was not the intended target of the operation.

DHS told ABC News that ICE agents spotted the white van that Salgado Araujo was driving, and they thought he “resembled the target” of their immigration operation, but they confirmed he was not the target, despite the department previously claiming he was in the country illegally, which his family disputed, saying he was in the process of getting a work permit.

“After receiving a credible tip from our law enforcement partners, our officers conducted surveillance on a target’s address. Weeks prior to the incident, they noted two white vans at the property,” a DHS official told ABC.  “On July 7, officers were almost at the target’s address when they observed a white van with an individual who resembled the target. Officers then initiated the vehicle stop.”

Meanwhile, the three men who were passengers in the van and were arrested after the shooting are disputing the government’s account of what happened, specifically, the allegation that Salgado Araujo used his vehicle to ram ICE vehicles and then tried to run over an agent. The men spoke from an immigration detention facility with their attorney, Hugo Balderas-Ibarra, who shared their written and oral accounts with the Washington Post.

From the Post:

DHS released a statement hours after the deadly shooting saying that Salgado Araujo had rammed an Immigration and Customs Enforcement vehicle and “weaponized” his white work van “in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer.”

“That is a lie,” wrote Jose Trinidad Rojas, 51, in a handwritten statement. “It is impossible for them to say that they were going to get run over … there were no officers in front of or behind the vehicle. They were on the sides.”

Balderas-Ibarra spoke to Rojas, Daniel Tirado Pantoja, 43, and the shooting victim’s brother, Victor Salgado, 44, and said he heard the same story from each as he interviewed them separately. The men are not being housed together, the attorney said.All three are undocumented Mexican immigrants who are now facing removal proceedings.

“All of them reiterated that there were never any ICE agents in front of the van,” Balderas-Ibarra said. “They came in and started shooting from the sides.”

They also claimed the officer who shot Salgado Araujo opened fire on them almost immediately after exiting his vehicle, and that at no point did Salgado Araujo veer in his direction.

KHOU 11 shared video footage from just before the shooting began, taken by a security camera at a nearby business.

From KHOU:

It happened on Canal Street in Magnolia Park. In the new video, you can see a white van driven by Lorenzo Salgado and an unmarked ICE vehicle end up just east of Wayside Drive. Before that, video shows ICE agents pursuing the van.

If you look closely through the trees in the video, you can see the white van followed by the ICE agents in a dark SUV. 

You can see the ICE vehicle appear to try to cut the van off and both vehicles veer off to the side of the road. Video shows the white van go in reverse, then forward where it pulled over a few houses away. 

Meanwhile, the ICE vehicle made a three-point turn on Canal Street and then drove forward to follow the white construction van.

This week, we reported that Salgado Araujo’s death has drawn the attention of Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who vowed Wednesday that there will be “legal measures” regarding Salgado Araujo’s death that will “go beyond” just complaining about injustice. Well, on Thursday, Mexican Foreign Minister Roberto Velasco announced that the Mexican government will request criminal charges on behalf of 17 Mexicans who died in ICE custody or during immigration enforcement operations, including Salgado Araujo.

Much like the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis, the death of Salgado Araujo appears to be a case the Trump administration can’t just sweep under the rug after demonizing the victim and expecting the general to take the government’s story at face value. Of course, it should also be noted that while there’s been plenty of public outrage over the deaths of Pretti and Good, no one has been legally held accountable for those killings. We’ll have to wait and see if Salgado Araujo’s case will shake out differently, but it’s difficult to be hopeful in a country that is currently being run by the cruel, bigoted and apathetic.

But we shall see.

SEE ALSO:

ICE Fatally Shoots Mexican Immigrant They Claim Weaponized His Vehicle

Mexican President Joins Fight For Justice In ICE Killing Of Immigrant