Attorney: ICE agent not justified in shooting Northwest Side man

A man was shot by a federal immigration agent on Monday morning in the front doorway of his Belmont Central neighborhood home on the Northwest Side.

Authorities said the 53-year-old pointed a weapon at U.S. Department of Homeland Security Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents as they tried to arrest his son. But an attorney for the man’s family says he was unarmed, and that the agents had no grounds to detain his 23-year-old son, a U.S.-born citizen.

“I really don’t know what [ICE agents] were doing there, and I don’t think they do either,” attorney Thomas Hallock said. “It’s bizarre.”

The shooting happened about 6:15 a.m. at the home in the 6100 block of West Grand, authorities said.

According to ICE spokesman Carl Rusnok, special agents were trying to make an arrest when a second person pointed a weapon at the agents. One agent opened fire, hitting the 53-year-old in the arm, according to Chicago Police, who said they weren’t involved in the arrest. He was taken in serious condition to Stroger Hospital, where he remained sedated Monday evening.

The wounded man told Hallock he heard loud noises outside his home, opened the door and heard three gunshots. Eight people were home at the time, including three children, Hallock said.

He has a valid firearm owners identification card, according to Hallock, who said his family is “adamant” that he doesn’t own a gun and wasn’t carrying one when agents arrived at his doorstep. Hallock expects the 53-year-old to face criminal charges.

Strands of crime scene tape clung to the railings along the front steps to the home Monday evening, when a person inside declined to open the door to a Chicago Sun-Times reporter.

The 53-year-old and his wife came to Chicago from Mexico more than 25 years ago and are legal residents, Hallock said. The agents were there to arrest his son, who was born in the U.S., Hallock said.

“How ICE is involved in this, I still can’t figure out,” Hallock said. “How hard is it to pull up their database and see this man and his family are citizens?”

The 23-year-old was held at the Grand Central CPD station Monday morning, transferred to an unknown West Side federal holding site and released without charges by 3:30 p.m., Hallock said.

He is facing felony charges of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon stemming from an arrest last month in the same neighborhood, court records show. His next court date is Wednesday.

The 23-year-old told Hallock that he recognized Chicago Police officers at the door from his previous arrest, though CPD spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said its officers “did not participate in the federal initiative.”

“CPD will investigate the underlying criminal offense and work in collaboration with DHS and the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois,” Guglielmi said.

The ICE Office of Professional Responsibility will review the shooting, Rusnok said.

“ICE’s guns blazing raid on a Northwest Side home filled with sleeping kids is exactly why the City of Chicago should refuse to collaborate with ICE,” 35th Ward Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa said in a statement.

State Sen. Omar Aquino (D-Chicago) said the shooting “should make everybody nervous about living in Donald Trump’s America.”

“The immigrants that I represent, both documented and undocumented, should be able to contribute to our communities without worrying about government harassment.”

Contributing: Jordan Owen and Ashlee Rezin