Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare confirmed Friday that his office is investigating the shooting death of a Houston man by an ICE agent, even though federal authorities have indicated they don’t want any outside help and have not yet released any evidence to the DA’s office.
And there’s not much evidence to release. U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia said at a Friday press conference that Acting ICE Director David Venturella confirmed to her by phone that the officers involved in the deadly July 7 incident in Houston’s Magnolia Park neighborhood weren’t wearing body cameras and three unmarked ICE vehicles on the scene were not equipped with dash cams.
Garcia said that last year, Congress authorized $20 million for ICE to purchase body cameras and was told that the devices would be distributed to field offices. Garcia says Venturella told her that the cameras will be given to ICE officers across the country by the end of this month.
Hugo Baldera-Ybarra, an attorney for two of the three men who witnessed the fatal shooting of Mexican immigrant Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, said his clients’ accounts of what transpired on Tuesday conflict with the limited information that’s been provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
ICE officials have said that on the morning of the shooting, Araujo, 52, ignored verbal warnings, rammed an unmarked federal vehicle and tried to run over an agent, but no evidence has been produced to corroborate those statements. Garcia said there was no damage to the unmarked black SUV that Araujo allegedly struck, and Baldera-Ybarra said his clients’ versions of events “are extremely different from what ICE agents are saying.”
Baldera-Ybarra said he met with the detainees at an ICE facility in Conroe and encouraged them not to sign anything or agree to return to Mexico while the investigation is underway. He’s also requested that they be released immediately.
“My clients will forever be physically and emotionally scarred by this,” he said. “None of these families will ever be whole again. What a devastating tragedy, and to what end? [Araujo] had no criminal record. He’d been in the United States for over 35 years. His only crime was that he fit the description of another man they were looking for.”
The three witnesses, one of whom is Araujo’s brother, were members of his work crew and were passengers in his van en route to a home building job when the incident occurred just before 7 a.m.
Garcia said that Venturella told her that Araujo was not the target of an immigration sweep but that the officers were focused on another person in the vehicle. A DHS statement shared by the Texas Tribune claims the agency “had received a tip from an unspecified law enforcement agency that led ICE agents to surveil a Houston residence and subsequently Lorenzo Salgado Araujo’s van.”
In response to a question about whether she believes the federal authorities are lying, Garcia acknowledged that conflicting information has been provided. The congresswoman said she asked for the name of the officer who fired the fatal shot and it was not provided. “It was a good conversation [with Venturella] but he made no commitment to an independent investigation,” she said. “He made no commitment to answering any questions that members of Congress with oversight responsibilities should be getting.”
Despite the lack of cooperation from the feds, Teare said he’s pursuing an investigation in response to pleas from the slain man’s family, community members and elected officials who don’t trust that ICE can objectively investigate itself. The DA repeatedly encouraged the public and the media to come forward with any witness statements, surveillance video or pertinent information they’ve obtained.
The FBI’s Houston field office is investigating the potential assault on a federal law enforcement officer, which Teare says is moot. The DHS Office of Inspector General is investigating Araujo’s death. Garcia said she was told there is no timeline for the completion of those investigations and is unclear on whether they’ve even started.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire has joined the chorus of Democratic lawmakers and policymakers in calling for an independent investigation but claimed earlier this week that HPD does not have jurisdiction to do such a probe and multiple investigations cannot be conducted simultaneously. On Friday morning, Whitmire directed Houston Police Chief Noe Diaz to send letters to the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI, indicating that Diaz will make all appropriate HPD resources available to support the investigation.
On Thursday, Garcia and other members of Houston’s congressional delegation issued a letter to the Department of Homeland Security and ICE demanding an “immediate, fully independent and transparent investigation” into Araujo’s death.
The delegation, which also includes Reps. Lizzie Fletcher, Al Green and Christian Menefee, also asked why Araujo was targeted, whether ICE had an administrative warrant, who authorized the operation, how many federal officers were present and what led to the shooting. They also said they want to know why Araujo’s name was released before his family was notified of his death and what steps DHS and ICE are taking to prevent another tragedy.
Garcia said Friday that Venturella told her he would not answer her questions until the investigation is complete. According to the congresswoman, he assured her he would apologize to the family if he determines that an error was made in releasing information about the shooting before the family was notified. “This is something of great concern for me,” Garcia said. “No family should ever learn about the death of a loved one through social media or a press report.”
The congresswoman said that while many questions remain unanswered, she’s confirmed that the unmarked ICE vehicles that approached Araujo’s van did not have lights or sirens.
“I pressed the ICE director that they should reconsider their policy of unmarked cars and that they should have something so that the public can know who it is if they’re being followed,” Garcia said. “If I’m followed by a black SUV and I don’t know who it is, I too would be scared and I too probably would not have stopped.”
Teare said he would go to “the ends of the earth” to find out what happened, noting that he’s been in communication with the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office in Minnesota, which launched inquiries into ICE shootings of American citizens in Minneapolis earlier this year and sued the federal government to gain access to evidence.
“We investigate every officer-involved shooting in Harris County,” Teare said. “When it involves an agency that is not ICE, universally we are invited in that day. We run a parallel investigation where we collaborate with law enforcement, be it a federal agency or state and local agencies. We were not invited into this scene on Tuesday.”
Teare said he sent investigators to Canal Street as soon as the scene was released by federal authorities on Tuesday, and they’ve been there ever since, looking for information to ensure that “a full and fair investigation is conducted.”
“When someone in our community loses their life at the hands of law enforcement, that is the ultimate breach of trust with our community,” he said. “If we aren’t transparent, if the people don’t believe that we are actively investigating and holding ourselves in law enforcement accountable, we will lose that trust so quickly.”
Green thanked Teare for “not allowing the feds to bully you and convince you that somehow, you don’t have the authority to investigate.”
“Mr. Araujo belongs to us,” Green said. “He belongs to the Constitution of the United States of America. He’s in our jurisdiction. We have a duty and a responsibility, in fact, an obligation, to bring justice to this cause. We don’t have to beg. We don’t have to grovel. We can demand.”
Green said he’s been assured by U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, the ranking member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, that “if we don’t get the results we’re looking for, we will have a shadow hearing right here in Houston, Texas.”
Fear and anger are growing among the predominantly Hispanic Magnolia Park neighborhood, said Cesar Espinosa, executive director of the immigrant-led civil rights group FIEL Houston, who led a vigil in Araujo’s honor earlier this week. However, there’s also unrest among immigrants and Latinos throughout Houston, Harris County and the surrounding areas. Because ICE agents also shot two documented American citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis earlier this year, there’s a sentiment that no one is safe, Espinosa told the Houston Press.
“If they come for one of us, they come for all of us,” he said.
Cypress-Tomball Democrats are holding a “Justice for Lorenzo” protest from 9 to 11 a.m. Saturday, July 11, at 1400 N. Loop 336 West in Conroe. Also on Saturday, the nonprofit group Organized Power in Numbers staff and volunteers will canvass East End businesses, informing owners and workers of their constitutional rights as ICE activity increases in Houston.
Neidi Dominguez, executive director of Organized Power in Numbers, said in a statement that ICE is terrorizing American cities and she doesn’t buy the claim that Araujo tried to run over an officer.
“We’ve heard that story before,” Dominguez said. “They said it about Renee Good, too. FBI Director Kash Patel and senior DOJ officials stopped agents from finishing a civil rights investigation into her killing because they were worried it would contradict Trump’s own account of what happened.”
“This isn’t the first time ICE has told us a story that didn’t hold up,” she added. “Construction workers build and run our cities. They deserve to make it home at the end of the day, not be shot on the way to work while their coworkers watch. Employers who depend on workers like Lorenzo must also speak up and demand justice for the hardworking communities who are under constant threat of violence from federal agents.”
