EDITOR’S NOTE: Watch the full interview on CNN’s Erin Burnett OutFront tonight at 7 p.m. ET.
A witness to the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by a federal immigration agent in Houston said Thursday he is traumatized and unable to sleep, especially since he says Salgado Araujo never posed a threat to officers and was going to surrender when his van was stopped.
ICE, in its initial statement early this month, said Salgado Araujo rammed into a law enforcement vehicle and refused to follow commands before an agent fired his weapon in self-defense.
“That’s a lie,” Jose Trinidad Rojas Pliego, 51, a passenger in the van who was released from ICE custody Wednesday, said in an exclusive interview with CNN airing on Erin Burnett OutFront.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson did not directly respond to Rojas Pliego’s claim, saying it is investigating the agent-involved shooting while the Houston FBI looks into the potential assault on a federal officer.
