Venezuelan man shot by ICE held with bullet lodged close to spine

ICE silent on what led to Austin traffic-stop shooting

Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, a 28-year-old Venezuelan man, was working as a DoorDash driver on Sunday when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers opened fire during a traffic stop in Austin, Texas. Immigration lawyer Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, who said she is representing Garces Perez’s family, said ICE agents boxed in his car and shot through the rear window.

Garces Perez was first taken to a hospital. NBC News reported that ICE agents pressed the hospital to release him into ICE custody quickly.

He was then transported to the South Texas ICE Processing Center in Pearsall, Texas, with a bullet lodged near his spine and without pain medication, Lincoln-Goldfinch said Monday. Doctors declined to remove the bullet because of its proximity to his spine, Garces Perez said during a news conference.

“I am not doing well due to the gunshot wound, and I have not received the medical attention that I require,” Garces Perez said through a translator at the Monday news conference, according to Axios. Lincoln-Goldfinch said Garces Perez slept overnight at the processing center without a bed. “They sent him to [an ICE facility] with a bullet in his back without pain medication, and he slept overnight in a processing center without a bed,” she said.

ICE said Sunday that Garces Perez’s condition is stable and that he is in federal custody “pending removal.” Federal authorities have not disclosed what led up to the shooting.

Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, said Monday on social media that ICE was going to take Garces Perez back to the hospital, though the agency had not confirmed that step as of the news conference. “He is in tremendous pain and tells us that the bullet is still inside his left side,” Castro said. “He can’t move the left side of his body.”

Immigration advocates are pressing for Garces Perez’s release before any deportation proceeds, arguing that he is the most important witness to the use of force by federal officers. “Wilber is a victim of the shooting and the most important witness to it. You do not deport the key witness to your own officer’s use of force,” Juan Proaño, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said at the press conference.

Lincoln-Goldfinch said Garces Perez entered the United States legally through CBP One, a Biden-era program, to seek asylum, according to CNN. The Trump administration has since ended the program. A court changed Garces Perez’s court date without notifying him, Lincoln-Goldfinch said.