A federal prosecutor in Texas released new information Thursday evening about the moments leading up to the fatal shooting of a Mexican national and longtime U.S. resident by an immigration officer in early July. The account raises fresh questions about the government’s previous assertion that the man hit an ICE vehicle before the officer opened fire.
Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, 52, was killed by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer on July 7 while he was driving to a construction job site in Houston with three co-workers, including his brother. His death prompted protests across the sprawling Texas city and intensified demands from his family for a clear accounting of what happened. Relatives have described Salgado Araujo as a devoted, hardworking father who had lived in the United States for 35 years and was close to securing legal status.
The Houston shooting occurred only days before two other men died in Florida and Maine amid President Donald Trump’s federal immigration crackdown, drawing renewed attention to the Department of Homeland Security’s enforcement practices and use of force.
Aaron Reitz, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas, said Thursday for the first time that ICE officers had been looking for two Guatemalan men who were potentially subject to deportation. According to Reitz, those men were believed to be in a van similar to the one Salgado Araujo was driving when he was killed. In a statement issued the day of the shooting, DHS had said Salgado Araujo was the target of an immigration enforcement operation and was living in the country without legal permission.
Reitz also said officers believed Salgado Araujo and the passengers in his vehicle matched the description of the Guatemalan men agents were seeking.
Four officers in two separate law enforcement vehicles first attempted to stop Salgado Araujo’s van by activating their police lights. Salgado Araujo made a U-turn and drove over a median in an effort to avoid the stop, Reitz said.
Later that morning, the officers came across Salgado Araujo’s van again and tried a second time to pull him over, this time essentially boxing in the vehicle, Reitz said. Two of the four agents stepped out and ordered Salgado Araujo to put the van in park. Moments before the shooting, one agent was “partially inside the van or immediately next to it” when Salgado Araujo attempted to reverse and then move forward again, according to Reitz.
DHS had previously accused Salgado Araujo of using his vehicle as a weapon, saying he rammed the van into a law enforcement vehicle and that an officer fired in self-defense. The latest statement from the U.S. attorney’s office, however, did not describe any collision between Salgado Araujo’s van and a law enforcement vehicle. It also did not state explicitly that the officer feared for his life. No injuries have been reported among the officers involved.
The latest statement didn’t name the officer who killed Salgado Araujo, nor did it specify if the officer who fired the shot was the same person who was next to, or partially inside, the van.
Reitz also said in the statement that officers “saw in plain view several small bags of a white, crystal-like substance inside the van” and that the FBI later executed a search warrant to investigate for possible illicit substances. Salgado Araujo’s brother, who was in the van when the shooting happened, has been in ICE detention since the incident. His attorney said the white substance was a salt mixture that the men used as electrolytes to stay hydrated while doing manual labor in the grueling Texas heat.
Few photos or videos surrounding the shooting in Houston have emerged on social media, unlike other deaths involving federal immigration officers.
