Attorney Patrick Kolasinski said federal prosecutors have told him that Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez is not under arrest, raising questions about why he was the target of an enforcement action. No one under that name from El Salvador is in ICE detention, according to the agency’s online detainee locator. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has not responded to inquiries about Kolasinki’s statements.

Tuesday’s encounter was among a string of shootings during the Trump administration’s aggressive push to detain and deport immigrants in the country illegally, about which questions have been raised with federal immigration officials.

DHS has said ICE agents fired defensive shots at Mendoza when he tried to drive into them after he was pulled over on Tuesday. Officials said they were conducting an enforcement stop targeting Mendoza, 36, in Patterson, a city about 75 miles (120 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco. They described him as a suspected gang member wanted in El Salvador for questioning in connection to a murder.

Kolasinski told reporters that Mendoza was having difficulty speaking because he was shot in the jaw, but that he said he was never a member of a gang. Kolasinski said previously that his client has been stopped for minor traffic infractions but has no criminal record in the U.S. and is not the subject of an arrest warrant in El Salvador, where he was acquitted of murder.

Kolasinski said that the FBI was leading the investigation of the shooting and that ICE was not currently involved in Mendoza’s case. The Department of Justice referred inquiries to the FBI, which said it couldn’t comment on an active investigation.

Kolasinski said that agents fired on Mendoza while the car was stopped and he drove away to flee the gunfire. “He fled in a panic because he was being fired on,” Kolasinski said. “He was not trying to hurt anyone … he was just scared he was going to die.”

According to a Oct. 25, 2019 court document from a judge in El Salvador, Mendoza, who was 29 at the time, was acquitted after being accused of murder and ordered immediately released. The document lists 10 others who were convicted of various crimes from aggravated robbery to murder, and mentions at least one of them was a member of the 18th Street Gang. But there is no mention of Mendoza belonging to a gang or being accused of carrying out gang activity in the document.

In the California ICE shooting, dashcam footage obtained by KCRA-TV shows three officers standing around a vehicle stopped on the side of a road. One of the officers appears to be touching the driver-side window when the car begins to back up and turn, hitting a vehicle behind it. At least two of the agents have weapons drawn, pointing at the car. The driver then pulls forward toward where the men are standing and turns sharply, driving over the roadway median.

The video has no sound and it’s unclear when the shots were fired or if words were said.

Mendoza’s fiancée was able to speak with him Wednesday before a surgery and again Thursday morning, Kolasinski said.

Kolasinski said Mendoza, a dual citizen of El Salvador and Mexico, came to the U.S. in 2019 but he said he did not know his legal status nor how he arrived to the country.

The attorney said his client works as a laborer to repair fire damage. He has a 2-year-old daughter and is engaged to a U.S. citizen, he said.

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With Border Patrol agents due to arrive, Ms. Pelosi issued the stark warning along with Kevin Mullin, a fellow Democratic representative, who represents the small slice of San Francisco that Ms. Pelosi doesn’t. President Trump has said several times in recent weeks that he wanted to send federal forces to the city.

“While the President may enjoy absolute immunity courtesy of his rogue Supreme Court, those who operate under his orders do not,” they wrote in a statement on Wednesday. “Our state and local authorities may arrest federal agents if they break California law — and if they are convicted, the President cannot pardon them.”

A spokeswoman with the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The idea appears to have come from Brooke Jenkins, the San Francisco district attorney. Ms. Jenkins said in an interview on Wednesday that she came up with the strategy after seeing federal agents repeatedly roughing up people in Los Angeles and Chicago.

If federal agents came to her city and did the same, District Attorney Jenkins decided, she would treat them like anybody else breaking the law and would seek to prosecute them.

Hit people with batons? Beat them up? Not on her watch, she said.

“I had lead time to think about what authority I have and what I can do,” she said. “This is something I felt very strongly about, and I had my office research it.”

District Attorney Jenkins said she had communicated with the San Francisco Police Department about arresting federal agents for “clear, excessive use of force” and that the agency was on board with the concept. A spokesman for the department did not return a request for comment on Wednesday.

District Attorney Jenkins said she did not envision police officers handcuffing federal agents in full view on city streets. Instead, she said, local law enforcement could review camera footage of beatings, if they occur, and try to identify the agent involved. Then, she said, she would ask a judge to sign a warrant for the agent’s arrest and seek to prosecute the agent in court.

“For me, this is about San Francisco and what I need to do for San Francisco,” she said.

That could be much easier said than done. Many federal agents are operating in masks and without badges or other identification; a California law barring agents from wearing masks does not take effect until January and even then is quite likely to face legal challenges. And the Trump administration could seek immunity for its officers or ignore the warrants altogether, Ms. Jenkins acknowledged.

She said she had not discussed her idea with other prosecutors in California or around the country.

District Attorney Jenkins shared the idea on X earlier this month after Marc Benioff, the chief executive of Salesforce, said that he would support President Trump sending National Guard troops to San Francisco. (Mr. Benioff later recanted and apologized for his statement on the Guard.)

The ability of states to arrest federal officers is murky, and without much legal precedent, said Erwin Chemerinsky, the dean of the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. A state cannot unduly interfere with the ability of a federal agent to enforce federal law, he said, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have the legal right to apprehend individuals suspected of being in the country illegally.

“As long as the ICE agents are acting legally, the state can’t prosecute them and hold them liable, even if it dislikes what they’re doing,” Mr. Chemerinsky said.

But immigration agents who overstep their legal bounds — for instance, by using excessive force — could be sued in California, he said.

“I think the ICE agents can be sued, for battery, for excessive force, in state court, and I think they can be similarly prosecuted,” Mr. Chemerinsky said. “If ICE agents act beyond their legal authority, and violate state law in doing so, they can be prosecuted.”

In their statement, Representatives Pelosi and Mullin made clear that they believed federal immigration agents had overstepped their authority in other situations.

“Reports of a planned mass immigration raid in the Bay Area are an appalling abuse of law enforcement power,” they wrote. “Broad sweeps that target families and terrorize law-abiding residents betray our nation’s values and waste resources that should focus on real threats to public safety.”

Spokespeople for both Democrats declined to further explain how they believed local or state police should arrest federal agents.

Representative Sam Liccardo, a Democrat who previously served as the mayor of San Jose, said he had spoken with colleagues and local law enforcement officials about such an action.

“All law enforcement must comply with the Constitution,” he said, “and to the extent that there’s a violation of federal or state constitutional protections or civil liberties, there’s certainly a basis for asserting a violation.”

In other cities where the federal government has escalated immigration enforcement, local authorities have complained that federal agents have bent the law and abused civilians.

Representative Ro Khanna, another Bay Area Democrat, has pushed for a requirement that immigration agents wear body cameras and visibly display their names during operations.

“The issue is, a lot of these ICE agents are harassing American citizens,” he said. “They’re acting in a lawless way.”

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Police have little or no insight into where the federal enforcement actions are taking place but often have to deal with the aftermath, including protests and questions from residents about what exactly happened. In some cases, local cops have been mistaken for federal agents, eroding years of work to have immigrant communities trust the police.

In Bell, chaos erupted when masked men arrived at a car wash and began detaining its workers, sparking a confrontation with residents and immigration rights advocates before they were forced to hastily drive over curbs and street islands to escape.

In Pasadena last week, a man stepped out of his unmarked vehicle at an intersection, unholstered his pistol and aimed it at a group of pedestrians before returning to his car, turning on its red and blue emergency lights and speeding off. Video of the incident went viral.

That incident left the police chief of Pasadena resigned to figure out whether it was a crime or part of a federal raid.

“There’s no way for us to verify,” Police Chief Gene Harris said.

The department reviewed surveillance footage and other video and saw the credentials on the man’s uniform, according to the chief.

“We were able to determine that to the best of our estimation he was an ICE agent. … We will not look into it any deeper than that,” he said.

At Dodger Stadium last week, immigration agents staged outside the parking lot prompted protests and questions that local officials had to address.

“They show up without uniforms. They show up completely masked. They refuse to give ID,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said during a news briefing after the Dodger Stadium incident. “Who are these people? And frankly, the vests that they have on look like they ordered them from Amazon. Are they bounty hunters? Are they vigilantes? If they’re federal officials, why is it that they do not identify themselves?”

Ed Obayashi, a Northern California deputy and use-of-force expert, said federal agents enjoy great autonomy and “can do what they want in their official capacity.”

“If they point a gun or take someone in, local police cannot step in and interfere regardless of the circumstances,” Obayashi said.

He said that federal agencies have extensive use-of-force policies on drawing weapons but that, ultimately, if the overall directive is to take this action, then the guidelines don’t matter.

“If Homeland Security says this is what we want, the policy guidelines when it comes to gun and force doesn’t matter,” he added. “There is little redress against federal law enforcement in the civil courts compared to local police.”

Federal agents are not subject to the same statues as local police, namely Section 1983 claims that allow people to sue certain government agencies and employees for violating their civil rights.

“The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly shielded federal agents from legal repercussions,” Obayashi said.

The incidents at Dodger Stadium, in Bell and in Pasadena unfolded more than two weeks after masked immigration agents descended on the region carrying out a wave of immigration sweeps in predominately Latino communities. Residents are on edge as masked men are appearing and detaining their friends, relatives and neighbors without any clear sign they are part of federal immigration enforcement and refuse to show identification or a warrant.

The Pasadena incident showed how social media can amplify an incident and highlight the lack of response from local officials.

In a video posted to Instagram from Pasadena, a suspected federal agent is seen exiting a Dodge Charger at an intersection and pointing his gun at members of the public.

In the video, a person walks up to the back of the Dodge Charger and appears to take a photo of the license plate. That’s when the driver gets out of the vehicle and points a gun at the person who was behind the vehicle, then toward another person outside of the video frame. The word “Police” is visible on the driver’s vest, along with a badge on his hip. After a few seconds, the man puts the gun away and gets back into the car as bystanders shout at him. The man then activates the vehicle’s red and blue lights common to law enforcement vehicles and drives away.

Citizens shared the vehicle’s license plate on social media, which led to more questions than answers.

According to Pasadena officials, the vehicle’s license plate is a “cold plate,” or untraceable, which is typically used by law enforcement in undercover criminal operations.

“One question is this a law enforcement agent or someone pretending to be a law enforcement agent, and there is no good answer here,” Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo told The Times. “[To] have a law enforcement agent draw his weapon and point it toward someone using their iPhone, and a crowd, is showing a lack of training and a lack of temperance in the use of force.”

He’s still hopeful that the federal government will acknowledge the incident and provide some clarity. As more immigration sweeps happen, Gordo is worried that there could be an accidental shooting or that police could end up caught in the middle if unidentified federal agents are pulling out their guns in public.

Previous administrations informed the city of enforcement actions to avoid accidental confrontations between law enforcement, according to Gordo.

“Our police need to be aware of undercover or unmarked law enforcement operations. These operations are endangering everyone in our neighborhoods,” he said.

If citizens do encounter a matter where it appears that someone is impersonating law enforcement, they should call 911, Harris said.

But local police will not interfere with federal activities, he said.

“I understand the lingering fear in the community,” Harris said. “I would tell [citizens] to defer to their own feelings, understand what’s going on around them.”

He added that federal immigration activities in Pasadena have not impeded local police efforts or response times. There have been no arrests, property damage or violence related to protests against the immigration sweeps in Pasadena, officials said.

About an hour’s drive inland in Fontana, the lack of clarity is making work harder for local police who have been mistaken for federal immigration agents.

Officers investigating a recent burglary were mistaken for federal immigration agents over social media, Fontana Police Sgt. Nathan Weiske said.

In another instance, undercover officers were confronted by protesters who thought they were conducting surveillance for an immigration sweep.

“It is not safe for our officers, or for others involved in any active police operations if misrepresentations or misunderstandings lead to inappropriate engagement,” Fontana Police Chief Michael Dorsey said in a Facebook post.

In some parts of the Southland, the response to the immigration raids can be swift and fierce.

In Bell, masked men in fatigues detained at least three people at a car wash, drawing a large protest.

Dozens of people swarmed the area and shouted at the agents, “Are you a bounty hunter? How much is the bounty for an illegal right now?” questioning their identities.

Video showed the men, wearing fatigues and balaclavas and carrying long weapons, fire tear gas to disperse the crowd so they could leave. The Department of Homeland Security said Border Patrol vehicles were damaged during the incident.

Huntington Park Mayor Arturo Flores calls the federal government’s presence in the region “political theater” meant to antagonize the Latino population.

Flores plans to introduce a motion to the City Council that will direct local police to ask federal agents to identify themselves if they attempt to carry out an immigration operation in the city.

“What happens if you have bad actors who decide to throw on an olive drab outfit and go around abducting people?” Flores told The Times. “I would not ask our officers to interfere with federal matters. But we have to be prepared to hold these agencies accountable for their actions. There’s a tragedy waiting to happen.”

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A divided Supreme Court on Monday allowed Border Patrol agents to resume cutting for now razor wire that Texas installed along a stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border that is at the center of an escalating standoff between the Biden administration and the state over immigration enforcement.

The 5-4 vote clears the way for Border Patrol agents to cut or clear out concertina wire that Texas has put along the banks of the Rio Grande to deter migrants from entering the U.S. illegally. Some migrants have been injured by the sharp wire and the Justice Department has argued the barrier impedes the U.S. government’s ability to patrol the border, including coming to the aid of migrants in need of help.

None of the justices provided any explanation for their vote. The one-page order is a victory for the Biden administration while the lawsuit over the wire continues.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott had authorized the wire, one of a series of aggressive measures the three-term Republican has taken on the border in the name of curbing illegal crossings from Mexico. His spokesman said the absence of razor wire and other deterrents encourages migrants to risk unsafe crossings and makes the job of Texas border personnel more difficult.

“This case is ongoing, and Governor Abbott will continue fighting to defend Texas’ property and its constitutional authority to secure the border,” Abbott spokesman Andrew Mahaleris said.

A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not immediately return a message seeking comment Monday.

A federal appeals court last month had forced federal agents to stop cutting the concertina wire.

The concertina wire stretches for roughly 30 miles (48 kilometers) near the border city of Eagle Pass, where earlier this month the Texas Military Department seized control of a city-owned park and began denying access to Border Patrol agents.

Eagle Park has become one of the busiest spots on the southern U.S. border for migrants illegally crossing from Mexico. Abbott has said Texas won’t allow Border Patrol agents into Shelby Park anymore, having expressed frustration over what he says are migrants illegally entering through Eagle Pass and then federal agents loading them onto buses.

Abbott also has authorized installing floating barriers in the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass and allowed troopers to arrest and jail thousands of migrants on trespassing charges. The administration also is challenging those actions in federal court.

In court papers, the administration said the wire impedes Border Patrol agents from reaching migrants as they cross the river and that, in any case, federal immigration law trumps Texas’ own efforts to stem the flow of migrants into the country.

Texas officials have argued that federal agents cut the wire to help groups crossing illegally through the river before taking them in for processing.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor sided with the administration. Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Clarence Thomas voted with Texas.

___ Weber reported from Austin, Texas. Associated Press writer Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas, contributed to this report.

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