Video captured U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents shooting a man on Tuesday, April 7, 2026, in Patterson, a small agricultural city in California’s Central Valley.
U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement
The man shot by immigration agents Tuesday during a targeted stop in Northern California said he tried to flee in his vehicle only after shots were fired, contradicting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s statement about the encounter, according to his lawyer.
Attorney Patrick Kolasinski and the man’s fiancee visited Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez, 36, on Thursday morning at Doctors Medical Center in Modesto, where he was recovering from three surgeries after sustaining at least six gunshot wounds, including to the face and arm.
“He fled in a panic because he was being fired on,” Kolasinski said after speaking with Mendoza Hernandez in the ICU. “He was not trying to hurt anybody — he was trying to get away because he’d already been shot at. He was just scared that he was going to die.”
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Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez, a 36-year-old father, was shot by ICE agents while driving to work around 6:15 a.m. Tuesday, April 7, 2026 in Patterson, a small city in Stanislaus County.
Courtesy of Patrick Kolasinski
The shooting happened around 6:15 a.m. after ICE agents pulled over Mendoza Hernandez near Interstate 5 in Patterson, a small agricultural city roughly 90 miles east of San Francisco, while he was driving to work.
ICE director Todd Lyons said agents targeted Mendoza Hernandez, who they described as an 18th Street gang member wanted in El Salvador for questioning in connection with a murder case. As agents approached, Mendoza Hernandez “weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run an officer over,” Lyons said.
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“Following their training, our officers fired defensive shots to protect themselves, their fellow agents and the public,” Lyons said.
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The FBI Sacramento field office is investigating the shooting alongside the Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Office. Neither agency responded to a request for comment Thursday.
Kolasinski said Mendoza Hernandez was not under arrest or in custody as a suspect, but was being monitored by the U.S. Department of Justice in connection with the federal investigation into the shooting.
Kolasinski has also disputed that Mendoza Hernandez was a gang member with an outstanding warrant in El Salvador.
Rather, according to court records Kolasinski obtained from El Salvador, Mendoza Hernandez was acquitted in a murder case in that country in 2019. He then came to the U.S., where he did not have legal status, Kolasinski said.
Mendoza Hernandez and his fiancee, a U.S. citizen, have a 2-year-old daughter.
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Early Tuesday morning, Mendoza Hernandez was driving to his job when ICE agents pulled him over and asked for his driver’s license, which he handed over, Kolasinski said.
But when they identified themselves as ICE officers, Mendoza Hernandez asked to call his fiancee and refused to step out of his car, which is when “the situation spiraled out of hand,” Kolasinski said.
Kolasinski said Mendoza Hernandez told him in Spanish during the hospital visit: “They just started shooting.”
Video shows agents surrounding a vehicle before it tried driving away in reverse. The vehicle was then seen driving forward, trying to cross the center divide, all while officers had their guns pointed at the driver.
U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement
In dash cam video that captured the brief encounter, three officers surround a black sedan pulled over on the side of the road.
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The driver lurches forward, then reverses away from the officers, striking a truck behind him. Two officers stand in front of the car with their guns drawn, and as the driver pulls forward in their direction, they run out of its path.
The video then shows the driver turning away from the officers, jumping a concrete median and entering the opposite lane in front of oncoming traffic.
It was not clear from the video when officers fired shots because the 30-second clip has no sound.