They came to Oregon to chase their own versions of the American dream.
Yorlenys Zambrano-Contreras arrived in 2023 with her teen son after living in Colombia and spent a short time in Portland’s temporary shelter for asylum seekers before venturing out on her own.
Luis David Nino-Moncada’s path to Portland is less clear, leading through Colorado, Washington state and Oregon.
The two, both from Venezuela, appeared in federal court last week in Portland after they were shot and wounded Jan. 8 in a Southeast Portland parking lot by a U.S. Border Patrol agent during a traffic stop. The shooting sparked fear and widespread protests and vigils in the city.
The agent shot Nino-Moncada, 33, in the arm and Zambrano-Contreras, 32, in the chest. U.S. Homeland Security officials have accused Nino-Moncada of trying to run the agents over with a Toyota truck he was driving and have claimed both he and Zambrano-Contreras are members of a violent Venezuelan gang but have provided little proof.
The Portland shooting came a day after a U.S.Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis fatally shot 37‑year‑old Renee Good, a U.S. citizen who was protesting ICE enforcement. Officials there also said she attempted to run the agents over with her car – a claim eyewitnesses and video footage have contradicted.
The Portland pair survived. The two were hospitalized then arrested and now face federal charges and the prospect of potential prison time or a swift deportation.
No videos and few outside witness accounts have surfaced in the Portland shooting. And little is still known about the two people who were shot. Here’s what we have learned:
Where they’re from
Zambrano-Contreras, known to family and friends as Nina, is originally from La Guaira State (previously Vargas State) in northern Venezuela, said Jose Garcia Escobar, a former boyfriend. Her mother and siblings still live there, he said.
Their relationship lasted two and half years when both lived in Colombia and he acted as a stepfather to her son while she also took care of his daughter, said Garcia Escobar, who still lives in Colombia.
While there, Zambrano-Contreras was a stay-at-home mother although she holds an accounting degree from the Universidad Nacional Experimental Politécnica de la Fuerza Armada Bolivariana, also known as UNEFA, a large university in Venezuela, he said.
A friend of Nino-Moncada’s who identified himself as Zamhir Pedraza on Facebook said he was Nino-Moncada’s childhood friend. He and Nino-Moncada grew up in Tachira State in Venezuela and have known each other since they were children, Pedraza said.
“He has no criminal record, he is a working man,” said Pedraza who was in Venezuela last week and later didn’t answer more questions about Nino-Moncada, including what type of work he did.
Coming to the U.S.
Zambrano-Contreras and her son left South America for the United States two and half years ago “to pursue the American dream,” her former boyfriend said. He stayed in Colombia, he said, because he didn’t want to travel without legal documentation.
“She went there in search of a better future with her son and to help her family,” Garcia Escobar told The Oregonian/OregonLive.
In an affidavit filed earlier this month, a Border Patrol agent from El Paso, Texas, wrote that Zambrano-Contreras unlawfully entered the country from Mexico about one mile east of the Paso Del Norte port of entry in September 2023. The affidavit doesn’t mention her son but a separate court document says she entered the U.S. “as part of a family unit.”
She was caught, then released “due to lack of space in the detention facility” and served with a notice to appear at the ICE office in Portland but never did, according to court documents. Her Immigration Court date was set for June 1, 2028.
The notice to appear in immigration court is the official document that Homeland Security uses to start a person’s deportation proceedings. It’s likely Zambrano-Contreras’ court date wasn’t scheduled until 2028 because of the historic backlog of immigration cases nationwide, which currently stands at more than 3 million.
Her border crossing came in the aftermath of the Biden administration’s moves to expand protections for Venezuelans. At the time, an ongoing political and economic crisis in Venezuela was pushing millions to flee the country.
That same year also saw record‑breaking migration at the U.S.-Mexico border, with a large share of arrivals coming from South America, including Venezuela. Those who crossed the border without authorization could still request asylum once inside the United States – something many South Americans did at the time.
It’s unknown whether any of these factors influenced Zambrano-Contreras’ decision to come to the U.S. or her release after her arrest in Texas. Immigration case records aren’t public.
It’s much less unclear why Nino-Moncada came to Oregon.
Homeland Security officials said he entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and was released by immigration officials. They did not specify the state where he arrived or was released.
In a federal affidavit for the assault charge filed against him after he was shot, an FBI agent wrote that an immigration judge in Denver ordered Nino-Moncada’s deportation in November 2024. Homeland Security officials said he has a final deportation order.
It’s not known whether he was living in Colorado at the time or if he was already in Oregon and ordered deported in absentia for not showing up in court. His deportation order is part of his immigration case and not publicly available.
FBI agents and other law enforcement at the scene at Southeast 146th and East Burnside Street where Nino-Moncada and Zambrano-Contreras ended up stopping to call 911 after they were shot by a Border Patrol at a medical clinic parking lot in Southeast Portland. Beth Nakamura
In the U.S.
Zambrano-Contreras’ social media account says she made it to Oregon in November 2023. Upon arrival, she and her son lived at the Welcome Center, a shelter for asylum seekers, said a manicurist from Vancouver who lived at the same center with her children at the time. The woman, also a Venezuelan immigrant, asked not to be named because her husband was recently detained by ICE agents.
The state of Oregon quietly opened the Welcome Center, housed at a former Ramada Inn near the Portland International Airport, in November 2022 after a group of asylum seekers arrived at the airport months earlier and began sleeping in the baggage claim area.
In late 2023, state officials abruptly closed the center and transitioned the remaining families into rental apartments in the community. The hotel provided housing to 469 people over 14 months at a cost of $29 million.
Jake Sunderland, a spokesperson for the Oregon Department of Human Services, declined due to privacy reasons to confirm whether Zambrano-Contreras and her son had stayed at the Welcome Center. He also declined to comment on the current whereabouts of her teenage son who is now 15, according to his mother’s social media accounts.
It’s also unclear whether the state paid for a rental apartment for Zambrano-Contreras and her son, as it did for some of the people at the Welcome Center. Public records and photos on the woman’s social media accounts show the family recently lived at a large apartment complex in Gresham. She also appears to have lived – or worked – part of the time at an extended stay hotel in Portland, according to court records.
While little is known about what Zambrano-Contreras did after leaving the Welcome Center, a screenshot of a dispatch log leaked after the shooting included a phone number that Nino-Moncada used to call 911. The number, which has since been disconnected, was linked to numerous escort sites for a woman whose photos resemble the photo of Zambrano-Contreras released by federal officials as well as the numerous photos posted on her Facebook and Instagram accounts.
Her personal Facebook accounts and Instagram feeds are filled with revealing selfies showing Zambrano-Contreras with long, dyed bright orange hair, flamboyant clothes, braces and a distinctive mark under her left eye. Though she doesn’t directly say what her job is, the photos and comments on her social feeds make it understood.
She also frequently posted photos of her teenage son and declarations of her love for him, as well as photos of her new cars, including what appears to be the red truck linked to the Border Patrol shooting. It was the same truck that Nino-Moncada reversed several times, ramming an empty federal rental car before getting shot and speeding off.
The manicurist – who became friends with Zambrano-Contreras after she visited her in Vancouver to get her nails done – said she was aware of what Zambrano-Contreras did for a living in Oregon, but that doesn’t make her a criminal, she said.
“She’s a normal, quiet, kind, hardworking girl,” the manicurist said. “She provides the best things she can for her son.”
Much less is known about Nino-Moncada. A records search revealed ties to Denver, Monroe near Seattle, Vancouver and Portland. An acquaintance said he also lived in Seattle.
His Facebook profile contains only three photos, 61 friends and very few posts. One photo shows him partying on a boat with a drink in hand, a second riding on a motorboat on a river and a third sitting inside a car.
The acquaintance of Nino-Moncada, who asked not to be named given the sensitivity of the case, said he met him about three years ago in Seattle when they lived in the same building. The acquaintance believes Nino-Moncada worked in “delivery” but did not provide any other details.
Their relationship
The Portland Police Bureau, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the FBI all declined to answer questions about Nino-Moncada’s relationship with Zambrano-Contreras. Federal officials did say in a news release that they aren’t married.
The manicurist said the two were romantically involved.
It’s unclear when and how they met but Nino-Moncada told FBI investigators that he and Zambrano-Contreras were friends for about a year, according to an affidavit.
He also said she asked him to sign for the red Toyota Tacoma at a dealership with the promise that she would make all the payments; she took possession of the truck at a dealership in September and she made the promised payments to him, he told FBI investigators.
Their relationship seems to have been complicated. Nino-Moncada has an open case from November in Washington County involving a misdemeanor allegation of driving under the influence and a felony allegation of unauthorized use of a vehicle. He is accused of driving a 2015 Chevrolet Camaro without the consent of the owner – who was identified as Zambrano-Contreras, court records show.
Tren de Aragua
Homeland Security officials have said Zambrano-Contreras was the target of the Border Patrol stop and have alleged she played an active role in a prostitution ring associated with Tren de Aragua and was “involved” in a Portland shooting last summer. Federal officials also have said Nino-Moncada is a suspected member or associate of the same gang.
Their defense lawyers contend that Homeland Security officials are blaming the victims for a federal officer’s unjustified shooting.
“The federal government has a well-documented history of making false and inflammatory statements about immigrants, Venezuelans in particular,’’ attorney Conor Huseby, who represents Zambrano-Contreras, said in a statement.
When U.S. Homeland Security was asked what evidence it had that suggests both Nino-Moncada and Zambrano-Contreras are affiliated with Tren de Aragua, the agency told The Oregonian/OregonLive: “We are confident in our intelligence indicating they are TdA and Portland police confirmed that fact.”
Portland police declined to comment on that statement. Police Chief Bob Day said at a news conference shortly after the shooting that Nino-Moncada and Zambrano-Contreras’ names had come up during a July shooting investigation but they were never arrested, charged or named as suspects. And Zambrano-Contreras hasn’t faced any new charges stemming from the alleged prostitution ring allegation.
Zambrano-Contreras doesn’t have much of a criminal record; she has one arrest for prostitution, according to police.
She also appeared to be the victim of physical violence and a prostitution-related robbery in Washington County last July, an affidavit indicated. She returned to an apartment to retrieve her belongings with several men, according to the affidavit.
One of the men broke a window and she went inside but couldn’t find them and left, she told investigators. Washington County deputies later were called to the scene on the report of a gunshot and found a 9mm casing near the back of the apartment, according to the affidavit
Zambrano-Contreras said she didn’t hear any shots. Investigators later matched the casing found at the apartment to casings at a shooting of a Venezuelan man in Portland four days later, according to the affidavit.
The man told police the shooting stemmed from an altercation with Tren de Aragua gang members, the affidavit said.
Nino-Moncada and Zambrano-Contreras were interviewed a month later during a prostitution sting and they were found with men who were identified as Tren de Aragua associates in the Portland shooting investigation, the records said. Investigators also said Zambrano-Contreras knew a man who was at both shootings who had been identified as a Tren de Aragua member.
Zambrano-Contreras’ former boyfriend said he was shocked by the gang-related accusations and that, to his knowledge, she doesn’t belong to Tren de Aragua or any other gang.
“By God, she’s not a bad person,” Garcia Escobar said. “She’s an excellent mother, daughter and sister, and I don’t recognize any of the bad things people say about her.”
The manicurist from Venezuela who now lives in Vancouver also said Zambrano-Contreras wasn’t part of Tren del Aragua. “As far as I know, she’s not (involved),” the woman said.
Nino-Moncada also doesn’t have much of a court record. Other than the Washington County DUI and unauthorized use of a vehicle case, a search of court records turned up nothing under his name in Denver and in the counties where he appeared to live in Washington state.
Pedraza, Nino-Moncada’s childhood friend, and Nino-Moncada’s acquaintance from Seattle said they didn’t believe Nino-Moncada was a member of Tren de Aragua.
The Trump administration has repeatedly claimed that Tren de Aragua “infiltrated” the regime of recently ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro (now in U.S. custody) and “invaded” the U.S. Trump officials have accused Venezuelan immigrants of gang membership and quickly deported 238 Venezuelan men to a notorious prison in El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.
But a New York Times investigation found no link between most of those men and the gang. A U.S. intelligence assessment – along with other internal government records – showed no organized threat from Tren de Aragua, instead portraying the gang’s U.S. presence as fragmented, low‑level and profit‑driven.
Where are they now
Nino-Moncada was treated at OHSU Hospital in Portland for a gunshot wound to his arm then booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center in downtown Portland on a U.S. Marshals Service hold.
He appeared twice last week in U.S. District Court in Portland on charges of assaulting a federal officer with a deadly or dangerous weapon — the Toyota truck he was driving when the agent shot him — and damaging federal property in excess of $1,000. He pleaded not guilty. A hearing was set for Wednesday to decide Nino-Moncada’s potential release pending trial.
Zambrano-Contreras underwent surgery at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center in Portland and was moved Jan. 10 to the ICE detention center in Tacoma, where she remains.
She briefly appeared in federal court by video Friday on the federal complaint alleging she illegally entered the United States in 2023. No immediate date was set for her next court appearance. Her lawyer declined to comment on her medical condition.
What counts, said the former boyfriend, is that she is alive. “I’m terrified by what’s happened to her,” Garcia Escobar said. “I’m glad she’s OK and hopefully, with God’s help, this will be resolved.”
Yesenia Amaro, Maxine Bernstein and Noelle Crombie contributed to this article.