Federal prosecutors on Tuesday announced an assault charge against a Venezuelan delivery driver who was shot in his car by a federal immigration agent in Texas, accusing the man of striking an officer with his side mirror while trying to drive away. Wilber Rafael Garcés Pérez, 28, was charged with one count of assaulting, resisting and impeding a federal officer, according to a criminal complaint. Garcés Pérez, whose attorney has said still has a bullet lodged in his back from the 20 September shooting, made an initial court appearance in an Austin federal court on Tuesday, according to the US attorney’s office in the western district of Texas.
A nine-page affidavit from a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agent amounts to the government’s fullest public account to date of the shooting in the Texas capital, which has set off protests and outrage from Democrats over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. The document includes photos taken from body-worn cameras but no video was released, and the complaint did not say whether the agent allegedly struck by the side mirror sustained any injuries. The accusations against Garcés Pérez were reminiscent of previous claims made by immigration agents after high-profile shootings, in which officers have similarly accused drivers of weaponizing their vehicles.
In a handful of cases, those allegations have been undermined or walked back after the release of body-worn camera footage, and have renewed scrutiny about the DHS’s reliance on vehicular stops to execute arrests. Garcés Pérez was in the custody of US marshals after being removed from a federal detention center in South Texas, according to court documents filed by federal prosecutors. Separately, Garcés Pérez’s attorneys have filed a lawsuit seeking to stop his removal from the US.
If convicted, Garcés Pérez faces up to 20 years in prison. An attorney for Garcés Pérez declined to immediately comment on Tuesday. A DHS spokesperson referred questions to the Department of Justice.
According to an affidavit signed by a DHS agent, officers first saw Garcés Pérez’s car parked outside of a restaurant with its emergency flashers on. They decided to pull him over after conducting a database check that showed the car was registered to Garcés Pérez who had a final order of removal from the US. The agents said that they turned on their lights to execute the stop, but in the same filing, Garcés Pérez told investigators that an unmarked SUV followed him and then abruptly cut him off on the side of the road.
Garcés Pérez, who was making a DoorDash delivery, provided his driver’s license through a crack in the window, but ignored agents’ requests to step out of the car, the complaint said. Garcés Pérez told investigators that he declined to exit because he had asked for officers to wait to apprehend him until his wife could come retrieve his car. Court documents describe the interaction as initially conversational, with a tone that was “pleasant and not aggressive”.
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