ICE shot Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, and DHS is hiding the truth
By Alma Cordero · Reporting from El Paso ·
After an ICE recruit shot DoorDash driver Wilber Rafael Garces Perez in the back, federal officials defended the brutality while attempting to deport a key witness to state violence.
The unmarked truck on the asphalt
Policy does not fall from the sky. It lands on the shoulder of a road in North Austin. There, an unmarked black truck sideswiped a blue sedan on a Sunday afternoon. Wilber Rafael Garces Perez was a Venezuelan citizen and a DoorDash driver trying to finish a delivery. He made a U-turn because he did not know the men in the SUV belonged to the federal government. He had no way of knowing. The vehicle hit his car again, agents exited, and an ICE recruit shot him squarely in the back. As the BBC reports, a bullet remains lodged near his spine. The shot fractured his clavicle, causing swelling, pain, and a loss of movement in his arm.
We have watched these exact mechanics play out before. As the record of the Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero shooting shows, federal agents turn municipal streets into free-fire zones. They do it under the guise of interior enforcement. In July, an ICE officer shot and killed Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian immigrant, during a traffic stop in Biddeford, Maine. Agents rammed his car first. Just days before that, ICE shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo during another traffic stop in Houston, Texas. These are not isolated accidents. They are the product of an agency that treats every intersection as an occupied border territory.
The Department of Homeland Security operates under a framework that primes its personnel for violence. As detailed in federal records, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin extended the Finding of Mass Influx of Aliens. He cited operational constraints, claiming ICE held a detention population of 67,022 out of a maximum capacity of 80,700. This emergency posture treats neighbors, workers, and asylum seekers as combatants. When you declare that an immigrant population threatens all states, you send a clear signal. You tell every untrained recruit with a badge that restraint is optional and force is the primary language of the state.
The machinery of cruelty in the cell
The cruelty did not end on the asphalt. Wilber was transferred to the South Texas ICE Processing Center in Pearsall, Texas. According to nbcnews.com, his immigration lawyer, Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, revealed that he soon lost movement on his left side. When he needed help, guards at the detention center reportedly took a tablet from his hands. They revoked his communication privileges and moved him from the infirmary to an isolated room with a flat bed. Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch stated on social media that guards handcuffed and shackled him. They placed him in a waist chain and handled him roughly during a transfer back to the hospital.
Against this suffering, the Department of Homeland Security erected a wall of arrogant denial. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin told the BBC that Wilber is an illegal alien who "has been given some of the best medical care he's ever received in his life." Mullin dismissed public outcry as smears and false narratives, vowing that ICE will not slow down or leave Austin. This language echoes the dark days of the family separation policy. Administrative officials inflicted profound trauma on human beings while publicly insisting that the system acted with absolute benevolence. They break your body, deny you basic dignity, and then look into a camera to lecture the public about safety.
The official story collapses the moment you look at the equipment—or rather, the lack of it. The Washington Post reported that the ICE officer who shot Wilber was a recruit issued a body camera he was not wearing. Another agent in the vehicle wore a camera, but the footage misses the shooting. This is not an oversight. It is a feature of law enforcement accountability, mirroring the exact mechanism seen in the death of Oscar Grant. There, bystander mobile phone footage uploaded to YouTube became the weapon marginalized communities used to puncture official lies about state violence. Without the dashcam and cellphone videos released by the Austin Police Department, the public would have only official lies. The federal government would have successfully framed an attack on an unarmed delivery driver as a routine administrative stop.
Justice deferred by federal decree
The defense will argue that Wilber Rafael Garces Perez violated federal immigration laws after his work permit expired last year. They claim officers must use necessary force during targeted stops against individuals who attempt to evade detention. That argument crumbles under the weight of basic human decency and the Constitution. An individual who overstays a visa does not forfeit their right to life. They do not become legitimate targets for summary execution by recruits operating without active body cameras. An administrative civil violation does not carry a death sentence. A democratic society cannot tolerate a police force that shoots people in the back for making a U-turn.
Fortunately, some checks still exist within the fractured architecture of our republic. As the BBC noted, U.S. Judge Orlando Garcia stepped in to temporarily block the deportation of Wilber Rafael Garces Perez. Judge Garcia scheduled an in-person hearing for September 30. Furthermore, the Travis County District Attorney’s Office requested that Wilber remain as a material witness in their criminal investigation. Democratic lawmakers like Texas Representative Joaquin Castro have intervened, demanding his immediate release from detention. They exposed the reality of a man sitting in a cell with a bullet lodged near his spine. He wears a sling and receives nothing more than Tylenol and ibuprofen for his agony.
The streets of Austin have already begun to answer back. KUT reported that protesters gathered at the Texas Capitol, demanding that ICE leave their city. Demonstrators chanted for the abolition of deportation. When officers responded with pepper ball bursts and projectiles, they underscored the depth of the police state taking root in our neighborhoods.
Wilber Rafael Garces Perez was hunted down on a Texas street by an untrained federal agent. He was shot in the back while trying to earn an honest living. Agents then tortured him with isolation and heavy chains inside a detention camp while the Department of Homeland Security lied about his care. Justice requires the immediate release of Wilber Rafael Garces Perez from federal custody. He needs specialized medical care to remove the bullet from his spine. Justice requires full criminal prosecution of the recruit who pulled the trigger. It requires the total expulsion of ICE from the municipalities whose residents they terrorize every single day.
Sources
- BBC: US judge blocks deportation of DoorDash driver shot by ICE
- The Washington Post: ICE officer in Texas shooting was recruit not using a body camera
- nbcnews.com: ICE officer who shot man in Austin was issued a body cam but wasn’t wearing it
- KUT: Protesters gather at Texas Capitol a day after Austin ICE shooting
- BBC: US judge blocks deportation of DoorDash driver shot by ICE