Federal prosecutors in Texas have charged a Venezuelan delivery driver who was shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent earlier this month for assaulting a federal agent, according to court documents released Tuesday.
Prosecutors accused Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, 28, of hitting an ICE agent with his vehicle’s rearview mirror as he drove away in an attempt to evade arrest. Garces Perez faces one count of assaulting, resisting and obstructing a federal agent.
A Department of Homeland Security Investigations agent outlined the allegations in an eight-page affidavit filed in support of a criminal complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. The agent said he interviewed one of the two ICE agents involved in the Sept. 20 incident, identified as DF. The other officer, LG, was the one who opened fire, and that officer’s account is not included in the record.
DF said the two agents began following Garces Perez’s car after checking his license plate and seeing that he had received a final order of deportation from an immigration judge.
The officers were in separate vehicles and stopped Garces Perez, the affidavit states, by parking in front of and behind Garces Perez’s car. The officers approached and told Garces Perez to get out, according to the affidavit, but he allegedly ignored the command and asked one of the officers, LG, if he could move the car and park it.
“About a minute later, GARCES abruptly closed the window and left. LG tried
to avoid contact with the car, but GARCES’ driver’s mirror hit LG in the chest as he
left,” the affidavit states.
The court filing includes three images captured by DF’s body camera showing LG standing to the side of the vehicle and appearing to move out of the way as the car moves forward:
Ministry of Justice 
Garces Perez then “led them on a high-speed chase through a commercial and residential area,” the affidavit states. DF said he asked dispatchers for help and lost sight of the other two vehicles. LG quickly called him on the phone and “told DF that GARCES tried to hit LG with his car and that LG fired his gun,” the affidavit states. LG was not wearing a body camera.
The HSI agent who wrote the affidavit also said he spoke to Garces Perez as part of the investigation. The Venezuelan man said one of the officers hit his car during the first traffic stop, a detail that was disputed by DF. He said he refused to get out of the car when ordered: “GARCES said he knew he was going to be apprehended, so he asked LG to let him park his car so his wife could come get it for him.”
Garces Perez admitted to taking off and said the short chase ended when “the SUV hit GARCES’ car and caused him to spin.”
“After a forced stop, GARCES recalled that LG fired his gun into the right rear window of GARCES’ car. GARCES was shot in the upper back. GARCES stated that after being shot, LG opened the driver’s door of his car and removed the keys from the ignition. He then told GARCES to stay inside and an ambulance was on the way,” the affidavit states.
The bullet lodged near Garces Perez’s spine and had not been removed as of last week. He is currently being held in an ICE detention center in Texas. His lawyer and Democratic lawmakers said he was in intense pain and needed surgery.
Last week, a federal judge ordered Garces Perez to attend an in-person hearing on Wednesday, September 30, preventing ICE from deporting him until then.
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