By Cybele Mayes-Osterman and Jack BrookAssociated Press\/Report for America\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Oct. 31, 2026 2:31 PM PT <\/p>\n
A federal immigration officer charged with aggravated assault after he ran over a Mexican man with his car in Houston will turn himself in on Monday, according to his attorney.<\/p>\n
Mario Alberto Morales, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer, struck Miguel Parra Hernandez, a 48-year-old construction worker, with his unmarked SUV on Oct. 10, as he chased Parra Hernandez through a parking lot. A grand jury indicted Morales on Friday on a felony charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.<\/p>\n
Morales is planning to turn himself in at a courthouse sometime Monday, his attorney, David Lindenmuth, told the Associated Press. Lindenmuth previously told the AP that the incident was \u201cclearly just an accident\u201d and that local officials had \u201cinvented a crime out of thin air.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parra Hernandez broke his leg and is recovering at a rehabilitation facility while in federal custody, Harris County Dist. Atty. Sean Teare told reporters Friday.<\/p>\n
ICE has said Parra Hernandez ran in front of Morales\u2019 car.<\/p>\n
Previously released surveillance camera video shows Morales\u2019 vehicle drive over a median and strike Parra Hernandez as he runs away.<\/p>\n
Teare played video from Morales\u2019 body camera on Friday that showed the agent making sharp turns with his steering wheel. He then stops and exits the vehicle and turns toward Parra Hernandez, who is lying on the ground, screaming.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was coming in, and I hit him with the car,\u201d Morales can be heard saying after another ICE agent arrives.<\/p>\n
Parra Hernandez told deputies that he fled the traffic stop when Morales started pulling on a mask, and Morales \u201cthrew the car\u201d at him, according to a Harris County Sheriff\u2019s Office incident report reviewed by the AP. Morales told deputies that he did not brake before he hit Parra Hernandez, but that he did not intentionally strike him, according to the report.<\/p>\n
ICE said after the incident that the target of the operation was a man named Jose Mendoza-Cervantes, who the agency said was seen getting into a car with Parra Hernandez. Mendoza-Cervantes\u2019 daughter told the immigrants\u2019 rights group FIEL that her father has been dead for nearly a decade.<\/p>\n
Morales is among a small group of federal agents who have been criminally charged for wounding people during the Trump administration\u2019s aggressive immigration crackdown. ICE agent Christian Castro pleaded not guilty last month to charges that he lied to the FBI after he shot and wounded a Venezuelan man as immigration agents swept Minneapolis earlier this year.<\/p>\n
Many other ICE shootings, including some that were fatal, have not resulted in charges for the agents involved.<\/p>\n
Morales, 34, has served as an ICE agent for a little over a year, according to Lindenmuth.<\/p>\n
Teare said Friday that authorities have a \u201csignificant amount of information\u201d on Morales, and that, in his experience, law enforcement agencies would not hire someone with his background. He did not elaborate.<\/p>\n
Morales was charged with a misdemeanor in 2013 for stealing four DVDs, according to Harris County court records. Those charges were dismissed after he paid a $270 fine and struck a plea deal.<\/p>\n
Morales unsuccessfully ran to represent Texas\u2019 34th Congressional District in this year\u2019s election cycle under the name \u201cBam Morales,\u201d which Lindenmuth confirmed. Morales served in the Army\u2019s 82nd Airborne Division and later as a corrections officer and law enforcement officer, he wrote in a Ballotpedia candidate survey<\/a>. He wrote that his top priorities were veterans\u2019 rights, economic issues and service guided by the Christian principles of \u201ccompassion, integrity, service, and accountability.\u201d He listed illegal immigration as one of the country\u2019s greatest challenges.<\/p>\n Morales also wrote in the survey that he was endorsed by an organization called Make America Godlier Again.<\/p>\n