AUSTIN, Texas (AP) \u2014 A Venezuelan man shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer was in custody Monday at an ICE detention center in Texas after he was released from a hospital with a bullet still lodged in his back, according to a spokesperson for the man’s attorney.<\/p>\n
Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, 28, was making a DoorDash delivery in the Texas capital of Austin on Sunday before he was shot during a traffic stop, said Fabiana Mel\u00e9ndez Ruiz, a spokesperson for immigration attorney Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch.<\/p>\n
Ruiz said that Perez called his wife around 12:30 p.m. Sunday to tell her that he had been shot. She said Perez’s wife hasn’t spoken with him since then.<\/p>\n
Perez was being detained at the South Texas ICE Processing Center in Pearsall, about 130 miles (209 kilometers) southwest of Austin, Ruiz told The Associated Press. She said Lincoln-Goldfinch spoke by phone with Perez, who told her that he was being interrogated while a bullet remained in his back. Perez also said he had no pain medication, according to Ruiz.<\/p>\n
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has released little information and has not said what prompted the shooting. In a statement early Monday, the department said it was investigating the shooting of a Venezuelan man in the U.S. illegally who “had a final order of removal.”<\/p>\n
Perez is an asylum seeker and entered the United States through a parole program, and he has no criminal history, Ruiz said.<\/p>\n
“Regardless of his status, the use of force was unwarranted,” Ruiz said. “As far as we understand, he was here legally.”<\/p>\n