{"id":766907,"date":"2026-07-16T20:01:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T20:01:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/766907\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T20:01:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T20:01:15","slug":"substance-fbi-agent-saw-in-van-of-man-fatally-shot-by-ice-in-houston-was-salt-family-attorney-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/766907\/","title":{"rendered":"Substance FBI agent saw in van of man fatally shot by ICE in Houston was salt, family attorney says"},"content":{"rendered":"

The FBI filed a search warrant application for the van driven by Lorenzo Salgado Araujo<\/a>, a father of three who was killed by ICE during a traffic stop in Texas<\/a> last week, saying an agent found small bags in the vehicle he believed could contain drugs. But the attorney for the Salgado Araujo family said Thursday the substance was salt that outdoor workers mixed with lemon and water to combat the Texas heat.<\/p>\n

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The FBI declined to comment to NBC News on whether the agency has executed the search warrant and whether any of the seized items tested positive for illegal drugs. <\/p>\n

\u201cOur understanding is that this was granulated salt, which is paired with lemon and water as a homemade electrolyte mix used by outdoor workers in extreme Texas heat, not methamphetamine or any other illicit substance,\u201d attorney Ruby L. Powers, who represents Salgado Araujo\u2019s brother, who was taken into custody following the shooting, said in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cA search warrant does not equate to guilt,\u201d Powers said. \u201cAn unidentified substance is not a confirmed narcotic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Powers said she was requesting that the substance be tested immediately \u201cso that their names can be cleared.\u201d She is also calling for Salgado Araujo\u2019s brother to be released from ICE custody.<\/p>\n

The top prosecutor in Houston and a group advocating for the man\u2019s family have criticized the FBI\u2019s unusual move, saying they do not believe there were drugs in the car and the search warrant does not change the facts of the fatal shooting. <\/p>\n

Salgado Araujo was in the van<\/a> with three others last Tuesday morning en route to a construction jobsite in Houston when ICE agents stopped the vehicle. Salgado Araujo was not the intended target<\/a> of the immigration agents, the Department of Homeland Security said. The agents attempted to arrest him and shot Salgado Araujo in the abdomen, killing him. <\/p>\n

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The Department of Homeland Security has said Salgado Araujo was in the country illegally and attempted to run over agents, but has not provided evidence of its claims. <\/p>\n

The FBI\u2019s Houston office previously stated it was called to the scene after the shooting to investigate the potential assault on a federal law enforcement officer. <\/p>\n

The federal search warrant application, which was filed Tuesday and signed by a judge, said an FBI agent who was outside the van looked inside and saw \u201cseveral plastic bags\u201d that he observed contained \u201ca white crystal-like substance.\u201d Photos attached with the application show several clear plastic bags with an unidentifiable substance strewn among construction materials like carpenter pencils.<\/p>\n

\"AFFIANTPhotos attached to the FBI affidavit. FBI<\/p>\n

The FBI agent believed the substance and the bags were \u201cconsistent with how users of drugs package controlled substances for distribution, manufacturing, and possession,\u201d and were consistent with potential methamphetamine, according to the search warrant application. <\/p>\n

The government has not said the ICE agents suspected any controlled substances in the vehicle when they pursued Salgado Araujo. DHS also has not indicated that he or the others in the van had any prior criminal history or history with controlled substances. <\/p>\n

Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare told NBC News Thursday that \u201cbased on what we\u2019ve learned about the passengers, it\u2019s inconsistent that drugs were in the van.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teare told CNN<\/a> earlier Thursday that the federal unsealing of the search warrant application \u201cis truly unique in my 20 years of doing this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is not something that we see the FBI or any federal agency do, especially prior to any presentation of a grand jury,\u201d he told the network.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy understanding is that this substance is being tested by the FBI, either today or in the next few days,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s so important to the public that those results be shared immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teare said that regardless, those test results would have \u201cno bearing whatsoever\u201d on whether the deadly use of force against Salgado Araujo was justified.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a red herring that really has no bearing on a death investigation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The FBI\u2019s Houston office referred questions related to the search warrant to the United States Attorney\u2019s Office for the Southern District of Texas, which said it did not have additional information to provide at this time.<\/p>\n

David Cruz, national communications director of the League of United Latin American Citizens, one of the civil rights organizations advocating for Salgado Araujo\u2019s family, said they believe the FBI search warrant is just one element in a broader effort from authorities to blame Salgado Araujo for his death \u201cand not the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who killed him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is sad to see that narrative,\u201d Cruz told NBC News in a phone interview Thursday. \u201cTo try and create a picture of a criminal after he was shot in cold blood, unarmed, on his way to work, is shameful, but it\u2019s not surprising.\u201d<\/p>\n

Regardless of what the FBI determines about the evidence upon searching, \u201cthat has nothing to do with the actions that happened in those fatal moments of that encounter last week,\u201d Cruz said, at the hands of an \u201cICE officer wearing no body cam, whom we are asked to believe without question.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n

DHS declined to comment on the FBI search warrant, and did not immediately respond to questions on the comments made by Teare and LULAC. <\/p>\n

Last week, DHS said after the fatal shooting that, according to information it received, Salgado Araujo rammed an ICE vehicle, refused to follow verbal commands and \u201cweaponized\u201d his vehicle, leading an officer to shoot him \u201cin self-defense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two of the men who were in the car with Salgado Araujo told their lawyer that \u201cat no point was there ever an agent standing in front of the vehicle, nor was an agent ever placed in the line of danger,\u201d their attorney, Hugo Balderas-Ibarra, said at a news conference last week.<\/p>\n

Ronaldo Salgado mourned his father\u2019s death on Facebook, calling him \u201ca hardworking Mexican man.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy father has been in this country for nearly 35 years, working in construction to provide for myself, my two brothers, and my mother,\u201d Ronaldo Salgado wrote<\/a>. \u201cHe was in the process of obtaining his work permit through the legal process. He was on his way to work, picking up his workers. My father did not deserve this.\u201d<\/p>\n

DHS\u2019 Office of Inspector General, the Harris County District Attorney\u2019s Office and the Texas Rangers are investigating the fatal shooting in Houston. <\/p>\n

Former FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jason Pack, who worked as an agent in the field for many years and reviewed the search warrant application, said a federal judge signed it, allowing the FBI to search the vehicle. Pack said the affidavit was going to be released to the public and what was different in this case, \u201cisn\u2019t the law. It\u2019s the speed and the choice to push it out fast, while the story\u2019s still hot.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe plain truth is that the affidavit only has to contain what\u2019s needed to get that one warrant signed,\u201d he said. \u201cThe agent flat out says he didn\u2019t put everything he knows in there. So it\u2019s accurate and it\u2019s incomplete at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Salgado Araujo\u2019s shooting came less than a week before the fatal shooting of Johan Sebasti\u00e1n Dur\u00e1n Guerrero by ICE in Main<\/a>e. Dur\u00e1n was also not the intended target of the immigration agents and both he and Salgado Araujo were killed during traffic stops. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The FBI filed a search warrant application for the van driven by Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a father of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":766908,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-766907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/766907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=766907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/766907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/766908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=766907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=766907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=766907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}