This Ain’t Making America Great. ICE Agent Indicted For Using SUV As A Weapon.
Federal immigration agent Mario A. Morales purposefully used his vehicle to take down a fleeing suspect on 10 October. Morales was indicted today on a charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. The person fleeing was Miguel Parra Hernandez, 48, who is not an undocumented immigrant. Hernandez suffered multiple leg fractures and a serious hip injury.
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The ICE agent, Morales, was driving an unmarked Jeep Cherokee and attempted to stop a pickup truck containing two men who jumped out and fled. Surveillance video showed Parra Hernandez, a Mexican construction worker with no criminal record or active deportation order, running across a restaurant parking lot with Morales pursuing in an SUV. Morales then swerved his vehicle into Hernandez and ran him over.
In an audio recording of Morales call to 911 requesting paramedics and the Harris County Sheriff’s Office, he is heard telling the dispatcher that Parra Hernandez ran in front of his vehicle and was hit. In a statement released after Morales’ indictment, an ICE spokesperson said: “Allegations that ICE struck Miguel Parra Hernandez intentionally are reckless and false. The men and women of ICE uphold the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and ethical conduct.”
Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez told a press conference today that investigators determined that at the time Morales struck Parra Hernandez, his SUV also contained two handcuffed detainees from an unrelated operation. Those two material witnesses to the incident were not interviewed by police and were deported within a week of Morales running Hernandez over. Police have also not been able to interview Hernandez, who is in rehab, and deportation proceedings have now begun against him. Hernandez is being deported for “damaging federal property.”
