An ICE agent long wanted in Minnesota for allegedly shooting a Venezuelan immigrant was finally captured by local authorities.
Christian Castro was booked in the Hennepin County Jail on Wednesday. He faces four second-degree assault charges, and another charge for false reporting of a crime, according to the jail’s inmate records. He is being held on $200,000 bail.
Castro will appear in a downtown Minneapolis courtroom on Thursday at 1:30 p.m. CT. He has not yet entered a plea.
Castro was one of thousands of agents that descended upon Minnesota during Donald Trump’s Operation Metro Surge. On January 14, Castro allegedly chased Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna, a DoorDash driver, to the entryway of his home. Upon arriving at the residence, Castro shot Aljorna’s roommate, Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis, in the leg. Castro claimed at the time that he shot Sosa-Celis in self-defense, purporting that the Venezuelan national had attacked him with a snow shovel.
But even Trump’s Justice Department had a difficult time proving that one. In a rare reversal, the DOJ moved to dismiss charges relating to the assault against Sosa-Celis and Aljorna, and Castro was the one left facing criminal consequences. Surveillance footage of the encounter released in April showed Sosa-Celis tossing the shovel early into his exchange with the ICE agent, and Castro firing shots into the home.
Extraditing the 52-year-old federal officer back to Minnesota proved to be a difficult task, however. Castro was initially arrested in Texas, days after a state court issued a nationwide warrant for his arrest in May. But Texas Governor Greg Abbott refused to hand Castro over to Minnesota, questioning whether Castro qualified as a fugitive since he had not technically fled Minnesota but had rather been transferred to work in Texas by the Department of Homeland Security.
Castro’s fate was stuck in limbo for months as the two states duked it out. He was released from jail in August after the 90-day limit on his detention had expired, and after a federal judge declined to intervene in the cross-country matter.
Yet the complications surrounding Castro’s case don’t end there. Earlier this month, a federal grand jury indicted Castro in a separate case, charging him with six counts of making false statements pertaining to the shooting.
The change was a stunning downgrade from the aggressive civil rights violations initially sought by the assistant U.S. attorney in Minnesota, Matthew Evans, who was in charge of prosecuting the case. It was also the result of Washington’s direct intervention.
On September 2, Evans told his staff that Castro would be charged “only with False Statements.” The shift would carry far less severe consequences if Castro is found guilty, but would also allow the DOJ to prosecute the case without having to debate whether the shooting was justified.
“This is being directed by the Main Justice and the US Attorney,” Evans wrote in an internal e-mail obtained by ProPublica. “I objected in the strongest possible terms and fought it as hard as I could. It wasn’t enough.”
The next day, Evans was fired. Castro turned himself in later that week while making his initial appearance in a District Court in McAllen, Texas. He was then released on bond.
Castro reappeared in Minneapolis this week under an agreement with Minnesota law enforcement, voluntarily driving himself across state lines in order to turn himself in. But state agents got him first, arresting Castro around 2:15 p.m. on Wednesday in Minneapolis, the department shared in a statement.
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