Witnesses dispute federal account of fatal ICE shooting in Houston

Three men who were inside a van when federal immigration officers shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston are challenging the government’s account of the encounter, saying the driver did not ram or “weaponize” the vehicle before he was killed.

Salgado Araujo, 52, was shot early Tuesday during what Immigration and Customs Enforcement described as a targeted enforcement operation. He was driving to a construction job site with his brother and two other men when two unmarked ICE vehicles began following them, his family and officials said. The men in the van were arrested after the shooting and are being held at the Montgomery processing center, a privately run ICE facility in Conroe, Texas.

The Department of Homeland Security said Salgado Araujo “rammed an ICE law enforcement vehicle, refused to follow multiple verbal commands, and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer resulting in our officer firing his weapon in self-defense.” A DHS spokesperson also said this week, “Dangerous criminals – whether they be illegal aliens or US citizens – are assaulting law enforcement and turning their vehicles into weapons to attack law enforcement.”

But attorney Hugo Balderas-Ibarra, who represents two of the men in the van, said Friday that all three witnesses reject that account. “After speaking with these three men that were in the vehicle with Lorenzo, I have no doubt that what these ICE agents are saying is completely false,” he said. “At no point did they ever use the van to ram into the ICE agents, and at no point were these ICE agents’ lives ever in any danger.”

Balderas-Ibarra said his clients told him no agent was ever in front of the vehicle or in danger. “At no point was there ever an agent standing in front of the vehicle, nor was an agent ever placed in the line of danger,” he said. The men said shots came from the sides of the van; Al Jazeera reported that they said the ICE agent fired from the passenger-side window. A written statement by one of the men reviewed by The Washington Post said, “there were no officers in front of or behind the vehicle. They were on the sides.”

Texas Rep. Sylvia Garcia said Friday that there was now “conflicting testimony” and that there appeared to be no damage to the vehicles at the scene. She said ICE’s acting director, David Venturella, told her the officers involved were not wearing body cameras and their vehicles did not have dashboard cameras.

Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national and father of three, had lived in the United States for nearly 35 years and had no criminal history, according to his family and lawmakers. His family said he was applying for legal status when he was killed. According to reporting by The New York Times and Garcia, Salgado Araujo and his brother were not ICE’s intended targets; officials were seeking someone they believed was in the van.

Bystander video shared on social media showed Salgado Araujo on the ground, bleeding and yelling, with two ICE officials over him. Balderas-Ibarra said Salgado Araujo’s last words were, “Ya me mataron,” Spanish for, “They’ve already killed me.” He was taken to a hospital, where he died. His son said the family learned of his death through social media posts.

The Harris County district attorney’s office has opened an investigation. District Attorney Sean Teare said his office was “not invited to the scene” but hoped the DHS inspector general’s office, which is also reviewing the shooting, would share information. “We will go to the ends of the earth to collect all the evidence so we can eventually let the public know what happened,” Teare said. The FBI is investigating whether Salgado Araujo assaulted ICE officials.

Family members and lawmakers have called for an independent investigation. “He did not deserve to die. He did not deserve to be reduced to a headline of ‘Mexican man shot and killed by ICE’,” his son Ronaldo Salgado said. “He deserved to live a quiet life as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a husband, a father and a job creator for dozens of men who also wanted the American dream.”

Balderas-Ibarra said the detained witnesses are being pressured to sign self-removal documents. “It is extremely important that we preserve the integrity of this investigation – that will all be out the window if they are deported,” he said.

On Thursday, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said her government will ask U.S. prosecutors to open criminal investigations into the deaths of Mexican citizens during immigration enforcement operations.