ICE agent who shot man in North Austin had no body camera, video shows

The ICE agent who shot Wilber Rafael Garcés Pérez in North Austin was not wearing a body camera, video from Austin police shows.

AUSTIN, Texas — An ICE agent shot a man in North Austin on Sunday about a week before the agency’s self-imposed deadline to put body cameras on its agents.

Video from Austin police, captured just after the shooting happened, shows the ICE agents involved not wearing those devices.

According to the Austin Police Department, ICE agents had pulled Wilber Rafael Garcés Pérez over on Anderson Square at 12:44 p.m. on Sunday. Shortly after that, police say Garcés Pérez drove off from that stop, which started a police chase. At 12:56 p.m., ICE agents shot Garcés Pérez through his car at the intersection of Anderson Square and Research Boulevard.

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Austin police released video from a responding APD officer’s body camera, showing the local officer helping remove Garcés Pérez from that vehicle and cutting into his shirt to begin evaluating a bullet wound in his upper back. Medics then took him to Dell Seton Medical Center shortly after.

The body camera video from APD shows ICE agents standing nearby after the shooting, not wearing body cameras.

During a press conference in New York on Sept. 1, Homeland Security Sec. Markwayne Mullin said ICE agents were expected to have body cameras soon. “By the end of September, I’m pretty sure we will be there,” Mullin said at the time.

U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat who represents Austin, said ICE agents should have already been wearing body cameras for the last year, pointing to a directive ICE issued in spring 2025, but noting that the agency “just doesn’t seem to be enforcing it.”

“In one violent instance after another around the country, the ICE agent never seems to be wearing the camera at the critical time, and I think that requires further investigation,” Doggett told KVUE Thursday.

Doggett also said APD’s body camera video appears to show ICE agents not rendering aid to Garcés Pérez. Doggett says ICE is required to give that aid.

ICE and the Department of Homeland Security have not responded to KVUE’s questions about their policies for rendering aid after a shooting, the training agents receive in those cases and their policy on shooting into vehicles.

“The best way that ICE can protect our community is to get out,” Doggett told KVUE. He said federal agents “seem to be operating more as a secret police force,” and should follow the same kinds of guidelines expected of the Travis County Sheriff’s Office and the Austin Police Department. He called for a closer look at ICE operations and said the country may need to “start all over” with border security.

Garcés Pérez remains in ICE custody and has not had the bullet removed from his back, according to his lawyer.