DHS Officials Change Story on Maryland ICE Shooting Following Police Investigation
What to Know
- The DHS initially claimed both injured men were in the same vehicle, but later clarified one was a passenger in an ICE vehicle during the shooting.
- Local police are investigating the incident, emphasizing the importance of transparency amid conflicting federal accounts and lack of body-camera footage.
- The incident has drawn national attention due to recent ICE-related shootings and debates over law enforcement transparency and accountability.
GLEN BURNIE, Maryland -- The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has changed its story one day after Anne Arundel County Police released a statement contradicting federal officials’ depiction of a shooting by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on Christmas Eve in Glen Burnie.
In an email Friday afternoon to the Capital Gazette, a DHS official agreed with county officers that one of the two men injured in the shooting was a passenger in an ICE vehicle at the time of the shooting.
The statement contradicts DHS’ first account of events, made in a Dec. 24 X post that said that both of the men injured in the shooting were in a van that drove “directly at ICE officers.”
DHS did not respond to a question on why the agency originally said the two men were in the same vehicle. The department has also not yet responded to a request for any potential body-camera footage of the shooting.
This week, ICE has made national headlines for its involvement in a fatal shooting in Minneapolis and a shooting that wounded two outside a hospital in Portland, Oregon.
While video footage and information about the ICE agent who fatally shot the woman in Minneapolis have come to light in the past two days, little information has been released about the Glen Burnie shooting. Federal officials have said the woman in Minneapolis was ramming her car at officers, though critics have said video evidence contradicts that account.
In a statement to the Capital Gazette, Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman said:
“This is exactly why the Anne Arundel County Police Department is investigating this incident, as we do all shootings in our county — to determine the facts. Federal authorities lied this week about what happened in front of the cameras in Minneapolis, and it makes all of us question what happened in the absence of cameras here in Glen Burnie.”
Officials said the Glen Burnie shooting took place near the 500 block of West Court, a largely residential area with single-family homes.
In its Dec. 24 X post, DHS said that ICE agents were conducting a “targeted immigration enforcement operation” in Glen Burnie that day when they approached two men in a van and told the driver, Tiago Alexandre Sousa-Martins, to turn off the van’s engine.
DHS said at the time that Sousa-Martins was in the country illegally from Portugal, and that the person the agency called his passenger, Solomon Antonio Serrano-Esquivel, was in the country illegally from El Salvador.
According to the X post, Sousa-Martins refused to turn off the engine and attempted to flee before “ramming his van into several ICE vehicles” and driving his van “directly at ICE officers.”
DHS said ICE agents “defensively fired” their guns and struck Sousa-Martins. The agency said Sousa-Martins then “wrecked” his van between two buildings, injuring Serrano-Esquivel.
On Thursday evening, Anne Arundel County Police said in a news release that the second man who was injured, Serrano-Esquivel, had already been in custody in an ICE vehicle at the time of the shooting. County police said Sousa-Martins was shot while “operating a separate vehicle.”
In a statement emailed to the Capital Gazette on Friday, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said Serrano-Esquivel was a passenger in “one of the ICE vehicles that was rammed.”
“Officers rendered immediate medical aid to both the driver of the vehicle and the passenger, who were transported to a local hospital for treatment in stable condition,” McLaughlin said. “Thankfully, the ICE officers were not severely injured.”
Sousa-Martins is being held at the Caroline Detention Facility in Bowling Green, Virginia, according to ICE’s detainee locator. Serrano-Esquivel is also in ICE custody.
McLaughlin said the shooting occurred “as the extremist anti-ICE rhetoric and outright lies of politicians, the news media, activists, and violent agitators continue to fuel a more than 1,150% increase in assaults against ICE officers.”
“Our brave officers are risking their lives every day to keep American communities safe by arresting and removing illegal aliens from our streets,” she said. “Continued efforts to encourage illegal aliens and violent agitators to actively resist ICE will only lead to more violent incidents, the extremist rhetoric must stop.”
Last month, an investigation by the Los Angeles Times found that comments made by the Trump administration on the increase of assaults on ICE agents in the past year were “misleading” and that most of the alleged assaults did not result in injuries.
On Dec. 24, Anne Arundel County Police spokesperson Justin Mulcahy said county police would investigate the shooting and that the FBI would investigate the alleged assault on the ICE agents.
In an email, the FBI Baltimore press office declined to comment on its investigation and referred the Capital Gazette to ICE.
Anne Arundel County Police declined to say whether they plan to file any criminal charges in the shooting incident, saying that it is an ongoing investigation.
In an email asking whether there are any plans to file criminal charges in connection with the shooting, Will Cockey, a spokesperson for the Anne Arundel County State’s Attorney’s Office, said that the shooting is still under active investigation by the county police department.
The Maryland Attorney General’s Office did not comment on whether it is involved in the investigation.
According to Maryland law, the Independent Investigations Division within the Maryland Attorney General’s Office is tasked with investigating police-involved incidents that result in death or injuries that are likely to result in death. The law states that this applies to local and state police officers, not federal officers.
In the release issued Thursday, Anne Arundel County Police said that they do not enforce immigration law or conduct immigration enforcement operations with ICE. The department said it does not ask questions about immigration status and serves all county residents and visitors.
Officials say anyone with information about the shooting can contact Anne Arundel County Police at 410-222-4731. Those who wish to remain anonymous can call the department’s tip line at 410-222-4700.
Have a news tip? Contact Maggie Trovato at [email protected], 443-890-0601 or on X @MaggieTrovato.
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