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The lawyer who is representing three witnesses to the murder of a man in Texas says he is disputing what the United States government said about the shooting, which was carried out by an agent of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Friday’s statement was about the shooting of 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in a parking lot on July 7 in Houston, Texas.
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The killing of Salgado Araujo is the latest in a series of immigration-related deaths under US President Donald Trump, who has led a massive deportation campaign since the start of his second term.
Lawyer Hugo Balderas-Ibarra said that all three men in the car and Salgado Araujo denied the allegations made by the Department of Homeland (DHS) that the father of three “rammed into an ICE security vehicle” and “armed his vehicle in an attempt to violate ICE laws”.
Instead, the three men said there was no disturbance and that an ICE agent opened fire through a side window.
“After talking to the three men who were in the car with Lorenzo, I have no doubt that what ICE is saying is false,” Balderas-Ibarra said.
“At no time did he use the vehicle to chase down ICE agents, and at no time were the lives of ICE agents in danger.”
Salgado Araujo and the three men were on their way to the workplace when they were stopped by immigration officials. All four were living in the U.S. without documents, although they said they were not the target of ICE.
Balderas-Ibarra echoed Salgado Araugo’s last words.
“Ya me mataron,” he said, using the Spanish word for “He killed me already.”
They call for an investigation
The killing of Salgado Araujo has led to new criticism of the methods used by immigration agencies, who are accused of violence, racial profiling and neglect of public safety.
His death has also fueled criticism of the Trump administration’s response to violent incidents involving aides.
Critics say that, in many high-profile cases, the authorities have framed the victims as criminals.
For example, in January, immigration police shot and killed two US citizens, Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, in separate incidents in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem quickly described the victims as “domestic criminals”. But the evidence in both cases contradicted the officials’ original accounts, either in part or in whole.
In Good’s case, video appears to show an ICE agent standing in front of his parked car. He could be seen spinning his wheels in an attempt to drive around the soldier, who opened fire as he climbed into the side of his SUV.
In Pretti’s case, footage showed the intruders wrestling him to the ground as he attempted to film them on his phone. The agent is then seen removing a gun from Pretti’s bag, which he was allowed to carry, before another officer opened fire and shot him.
Research into both of these situations has yielded few answers.
In other news, an ICE agent was arrested in May after facing charges of making false reports in the fatal shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis, a Venezuelan man.
Families and lawmakers have called for it useless research the killing of Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national who had lived in the US for 35 years and had no record.
His family, including his three older sons, said he was in the process of applying for legal recognition when he was killed.
“He didn’t deserve to die. He didn’t deserve to be turned into the headline ‘Mexican shot and killed by ICE’,” his son Ronaldo Salgado said at a press conference this week.
“He should have lived a quiet life like Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, husband, father and job creator for many men who also want the American dream.”
On Thursday, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said her government would ask US prosecutors to open an investigation into the deaths of its citizens during immigration enforcement.
