Witnesses challenge ICE account in fatal Houston shooting of Mexican man
Witnesses say ICE fired through an open window as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo sat in a van, a version at odds with the agency’s account of a Houston arrest attempt.
Witness accounts challenge ICE’s version of the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican national who had lived in Houston for about 35 years. His family said he worked in construction, owned a business, and was close to securing legal U.S. residency or a work permit before he was killed near Canal Street and Wayside Drive in Houston’s East End on July 7, 2026.
ICE said the shooting happened during a targeted enforcement operation in the predominantly Latino neighborhood after agents tried to stop Araujo’s vehicle and said he attempted to evade arrest and use the car as a weapon. The family’s lawyer and witness accounts relayed publicly by Rep. Sylvia Garcia say the fatal shot was fired through an open passenger-side window. The three passengers who saw the shooting were detained by ICE after the encounter.
The officers involved did not have body cameras. Authorities were also examining video and the broader enforcement operation in the East End as local leaders pressed for more transparency. Former Houston City Council member Letitia Plummer joined those calls, as did Araujo’s family, which described him as a father, husband and business owner who had spent most of his life in the United States.
More than 1,000 protesters marched in Houston on July 8, 2026, near the scene of the shooting, chanting “ICE out of Houston” and demanding an independent investigation. A candlelight vigil followed at the site.
The shooting came amid an intensified federal immigration crackdown under President Donald Trump’s second term. Reuters counted it as at least the sixth fatal shooting tied to immigration enforcement operations since January 2025.
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