A statement from federal officials about what led to the fatal shooting of a man in Houston during an immigration operation this week doesn’t match the version of events from three men detained during the incident, an attorney who spoke with them says.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have said an agent opened fire after Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican national, rammed a law enforcement vehicle and refused to follow verbal commands during a a traffic stop that was part of a “targeted operation” Tuesday.
But attorney Hugo Balderas-Ibarra said three men detained during the operation told him the version of events presented by ICE is false.
“At no point did they 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 in a video posted to his Instagram.
The men said the agent who shot Salgado Araujo opened fire almost immediately after exiting his vehicle, Balderas-Ibarra told The Washington Post. CNN has reached out to Balderas-Ibarra and ICE for comment.
