The charges come in the wake of the Jan. 14 shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis, who suffered a non-life-threatening injury to his leg.
MINNEAPOLIS — Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty announced her office filed charges against the federal immigration agent accused of shooting and injuring a man in north Minneapolis earlier this year.
Moriarty revealed Christian Castro, 52, was charged with four counts of second-degree assault with a weapon and one count of falsely reporting a crime during a news conference on Monday afternoon. Moriarty said Castro has a nationwide warrant out for his arrest.
The charges come in the wake of the Jan. 14 shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis, who suffered a non-life-threatening injury to his leg, exactly one week after Renee Good was shot and killed by an agent in south Minneapolis.
“A violent crime did occur that night, but it was Mr. Castro who committed it,” Moriarty said. “He shot through the door of a home with many people, including children, inside, while fortunately missing several others. … Mr. Castro is an ICE agent, but his federal badge does not make him immune from state charges for his criminal conduct in Minnesota.”
Moriarty went on to say that following the incident, ICE Director Todd Lyons actually acknowledged that two ICE officers lied in its aftermath — Castro being one of them.
Moriarty said it’s possible Castro’s defense team could try to get the case moved into federal court, but maintained her office will still lead the prosecution. In any case, should Castro be convicted, Moriarty said the ICE agent will not be eligible for a presidential pardon.
“There’s a long line of cases where state authorities have had to hold federal agents accountable for breaking state law,” she said.
The U.S. Department of Justice has so far declined to pursue charges against any of the officers allegedly involved in the shootings, including those accused of shooting and killing Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24.
The DOJ did, however, initially press charges against Sosa-Celis, claiming he struck an officer with a shovel as the agent pursued another man.
Surveillance video later showed there was no evidence to support the government’s claim that the men had assaulted the agent. Moriarty also said that while the feds were allegedly focused on a deportation mission that night, they soon learned it had been a “case of mistaken identity.”
“What I want to say very clearly is that they were here lawfully,” Moriarty said. “… He was not the person that they thought he was, and I’m just going to emphasize again, they were both here lawfully.”
Minnesota U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen subsequently urged the court to dismiss the charges against Sosa-Celis with prejudice, which means the charges cannot be refiled. A judge approved the dismissal in early February.