Houston mayor says city launching its own probe into deadly ICE shooting

Houston Mayor John Whitmire (D) said Friday that his office “will not rest” until there is a “thorough and independent” investigation into the deadly shooting of a 52-year-old Mexican national by a federal officer, vowing to move forward with a city-level probe on the latest fatal encounter during the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.

The mayor noted during an afternoon press conference that he directed Houston Police Chief Noe Diaz to take a “proactive” approach to the investigation into the death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo.

But Whitmire acknowledged those efforts have proven “difficult” because federal authorities control all the evidence in the case, including the “van, the passengers [and] the deceased.”

“The FBI has all the evidence that would normally go into an HPD or other law enforcement agency’s investigation,” he said. “And they’re tightly controlling it.”

Salgado Araujo was shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during a traffic stop just before 7 a.m. local time on Tuesday in what federal officials now admit was a case of mistaken identity.

The man, who had lived and worked in the Houston area for nearly 35 years,........

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