Arya News - Christian Castro, accused of carrying out nonfatal shooting in Minnesota, walks free due to extradition lapse.
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer charged with shooting a Venezuelan man and allegedly lying about it during an immigration raid in Minneapolis was released from a Texas jail a day after a federal judge refused to order his return to the US state of Minnesota.
The former ICE agent, Christian Castro, had been detained in a county jail in Texas since May, charged in connection with the nonfatal shooting of 24-year-old Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis and hitting him in the leg when firing through the front door of his home during an immigration crackdown in Minnesota on January 14.
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Castro was freed on Thursday morning from the Carrizales-Rucker Cameron County Detention Center near Brownsville, Texas, a city on the US border with Mexico. A Minnesota judge had issued a nationwide warrant for his arrest in May. Minnesota officials and the state’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension eventually detained him in Texas on May 29. Minnesota authorities then sought his extradition.
Under Texas law, the state cannot hold the subject of an extradition order for more than 90 days. At that point, the suspect must either be transferred or released. The deadline for Castro expired on Thursday.
Upon exiting the detention centre, Castro motioned towards a few camera operators and a reporter crowding around him and quickly got into an SUV that drove off.
In a ruling on Wednesday, District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr wrote that he could not intervene or prevent a county sheriff from releasing Castro given that Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican and close political ally of Trump, had refused to sign the extradition warrant for political reasons. Abbott argued that he is waiting for the outcome of an internal state investigation considering whether Castro was legally a “fugitive” under the Extradition Clause, lawyers for the state of Texas said.
The governor also said last week that he would not respond to the extradition request, citing ongoing investigations into alleged fraud in Minnesota’s social service programmes, which Trump used to justify his immigration crackdown there.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed a request for a temporary restraining order last week to block Castro’s anticipated release. He also sued Abbott to try to force his hand at signing the extradition warrant.
Ellison said Abbott’s inaction unlawfully sidestepped federal extradition to bolster Trump’s deportation campaign. He declared that legal proceedings would persist but omitted specifying what those future actions would entail.
Beginning in December, Trump orchestrated a large-scale deployment of federal agents to Minnesota. The operation lasted less than three months and fuelled protests and allegations of civil liberties violations from residents and watchdog groups. Two US citizens were killed by federal agents during the operation.
Minnesota officials have warned that Castro may flee the US if released, citing calls he made from jail to a woman in Mexico.
During those calls, Castro talked “about marrying her and buying a house in Mexico when he is released”, according to Minnesota’s lawsuit.
The judge conceded that Castro could indeed flee the country but added that “the threat of injury by itself does not create an issue ripe for adjudication”.