US authorities arrested this Friday an agent who was accused of having shot a Venezuelan migrant this year in Minnesota and having lied about the event.
The accused, Christian Castro, who faces four charges of second-degree assault, was arrested in Texas after investigators from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension located him, according to the Hennepin County Prosecutor’s Office in a statement.
The Venezuelan migrant, Julio Sosa-Celis, was hit in the leg by one of the shots. The bullet went through the front door and hit the leg by Sosa-Celis before passing through a closet and lodging in the wall of a child’s room.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initially stated that the shooting occurred after Sosa-Celis and another Venezuelan, Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna, allegedly attacked the agent with a shovel and broom. Although they were initially accused of assaulting the officer, all charges were ultimately dismissed after Minnesota prosecutors said the new evidence was “substantially inconsistent with the allegations” against him.
“Today’s arrest represents a crucial step in the prosecution of Mr. Castro,” Moriarty said in his statement this Friday, “to bring accountability for this incident on behalf of Mr. Sosa-Celis, his family and our community.”
The incident occurred within the framework of the Metro Surge immigration control operation. The Trump Administration sent 3,000 federal agents a in a repression exercise, according to local authorities, that ended with the shooting deaths of two American citizens: Renee Good, 37, a writer and poet, with two small children, and Alex Pretti, also 37, an intensive care nurse at a local Veterans Affairs hospital.
