DOJ charges Venezuelan man shot by ICE agent with assaulting an officer

Federal prosecutors in Texas have filed a criminal charge against Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, a 28-year-old Venezuelan delivery driver who was wounded by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent earlier this month. Court documents made public Tuesday accuse him of assaulting a federal officer. The government's allegation is that he hit an ICE officer with his vehicle while pulling away in an effort to avoid being arrested, according to CBS News.

The Department of Homeland Security has stated that Garces Perez is in the country unlawfully, saying an immigration judge had previously ordered him removed. The charge adds a criminal case to a shooting that has already drawn attention, and it puts the agency's account of the encounter at the center of the dispute over what happened.

CBS News has also reported on related developments, though the details are not laid out in the material provided here. Its coverage includes reporting, citing sources, that the ICE officer who fired was not wearing a body camera. It also includes a lawyer's statement that the man was being held in detention with a bullet still lodged in his back, and an attorney's statement that he later went back to the hospital from the detention center with paralysis on his left side.

The filing sets out the prosecution's version of events, and the charge represents the government's claim rather than a finding by a court. Garces Perez is described only as a delivery driver from Venezuela.

Summarized by PolitiKool from CBS News’s reporting. Read the full story at CBS News →