A grand jury in Harris County, Texas, has indicted an ICE officer on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, accusing him of intentionally driving over a migrant as he fled.
Officer Mario Alberto Morales was driving the unmarked SUV on Oct. 10 when he struck Miguel Parra Hernandez, county authorities said.
They played video from a local surveillance camera and Officer Morales’s body camera that showed him plow through a man.
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“Morales aggressively steered his vehicle into Parra Hernandez,” District Attorney Sean Teare said Friday. “Not only did he hit Mr. Hernandez, he ran over both of his legs, leaving him seriously injured and hospitalized to this day.”
Officer Morales then called 911 and reported that the migrant had hit his vehicle.
Mr. Teare said he intended the case to be a warning to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, whom he said “terrorize our streets.”
“The time to stop is now, and if you don’t, you will be held accountable,” he said.
ICE, in a statement, vehemently denied the allegation that the officer intentionally struck the migrant, labeling it “reckless and false.”
The agency also called the charges a “political stunt by Houston sanctuary politicians,” and said only federal agencies can investigate federal officers.
“Local governments do not have the authority to run such an investigation,” ICE said.
“That’s just patently false,” Mr. Teare said.
He said Officer Morales was part of the “surge” hiring at ICE, which saw the agency bring in thousands of new officers. ICE opponents and even some long-time officers within ICE have questioned the screening and training.
Mr. Teare suggested those criticisms might apply to Officer Morales’s hiring, based on what he saw in the officer’s background.
“I can unequivocally tell you that I reviewed thousands of job applications and resumes for law enforcement officers around this state and I’m not familiar with a single agency that would have hired this person,” the district attorney said.
He said Officer Morales was not in custody as of Friday morning but would be soon.
Mr. Hernandez was a long-time illegal immigrant. The district attorney said he had no criminal record and didn’t have a pending immigration case against him.
ICE was apparently seeking to arrest another person in a vehicle with Mr. Hernandez when the migrant ran.
The indictment is the latest in a growing string of cases against ICE personnel.
Investigations are still ongoing in the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minnesota in January, and no charges have been filed in those cases.
But an ICE officer was charged, both locally and federally, with assault and lying about his encounter that left a migrant shot. And another ICE officer was charged with assault for pointing his weapon at a couple that he believed had cut off his vehicle on a highway.
The officer in that second case has petitioned to have the matter moved from a Minnesota court to a federal court.
Joining Mr. Teare in announcing the case Friday was Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez, whose office led the investigation into the case.
Ironically, Sheriff Gonzalez was President Biden’s nominee to lead ICE. His nomination was withdrawn in 2022.
Sheriff Gonzalez said while bad actors need to be held responsible, he said the case doesn’t tar ICE as a whole.
“This case is about the actions of an individual. It should not be viewed as a reflection of every federal agent,” he said.
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