Man shot by ICE in Patterson indicted by grand jury for assault, property damage
A Patterson man who was shot seven times by immigration agents and then charged with assaulting a federal officer with his car while trying to flee has been formally indicted by a federal grand jury in connection with the incident, court documents show.
The jury handed up two counts of assaulting a federal officer and one count of damaging federal property against Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez, 36, stemming from a traffic stop with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents that turned violent April 7 in Patterson.
Mendoza Hernandez, who was born in El Salvador and lived with his fiancee and a 2-year-old-child in Patterson, was sought by ICE because he was in the U.S. without authorization, prosecutors have said.
The agents followed him from his home that day, pulling him over in his Toyota C-HR near an entrance to Interstate 5 in Patterson. Within minutes of the stop, agents drew their firearms, saying later in court documents that Mendoza Hernandez had refused to get out of the car.
An agent broke the window of the car, and Mendoza Hernandez moved forward in the vehicle, hitting the corner of an agent’s vehicle. At least one agent fired at him at that point. The car then backed up and swung forward again, coming close to the same agent as Mendoza Hernandez sped away, bouncing across a center median before stopping his car near the entrance to the freeway, according to court documents.
He was then taken to Doctors Medical Center in Modesto, where he was treated in the intensive care unit.
An indictment filed in federal court in Sacramento on Thursday charges Mendoza Hernandez with one count of assault with a deadly weapon for each time his car lurched forward, incidents the government said were about seven seconds apart. The charge of damaging federal property stems from his car hitting the corner of the ICE vehicle, the indictment shows.
“The defendant drove his car at Agent 1 at approximately 6:28:18 a.m.,” count one of the indictment reads.
Count two is nearly identical. “The defendant drove his car at Agent 1 at approximately 6:28:25 a.m.,” it reads.
The indictment does not allege that Mendoza Hernandez struck the agent with his car. However, in an earlier motion filed April 16, prosecutors said the agent was leaning on the car when it began to move.
“When Mendoza Hernandez drove the car forward, Agent 1’s body was leaning on the front driver’s side fender,” the government wrote in its motion. “Mendoza Hernandez’s sudden forward surge in the car caused Agent 1’s body to be pushed off of the Toyota’s front fender.”
Heather Williams, the federal public defender for the Eastern District of California, said she was not surprised that a grand jury indicted Mendoza Hernandez, because the defense is not allowed to be present or make any arguments during their deliberations.
That will not be the case in court, she said, where Mendoza Hernandez will have the opportunity to defend himself.
“The next phase of this case is when we hope Carlos’ full story will come out,” she said.
If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each count, U.S. Attorney Eric Grant said in a press release.
Mendoza Hernandez is still recovering from his wounds, both prosecutors and his public defender said in a separate court document filed Thursday. He is being held at the California City Detention Facility in eastern Kern County’s high desert after efforts to book him into county jails closer to his Sacramento hearings failed last month.
His case has drawn widespread attention and Mendoza’s family and other advocates have packed court hearings where he has appeared in a wheelchair and an orange jail jumpsuit. He was shot in the mouth, the arm and the side of his torso, and on April 13 he was released from the ICU to the custody of the FBI.
The next day, he was ordered released pending trial by U.S. Magistrate Judge Allison Claire, but that ruling was appealed by the government and overturned April 21 by U.S. District Judge Dale Drozd.
Because of his injuries, attorneys for both sides have asked the court to consolidate his hearing process, requesting that an arraignment and status hearing be combined on the morning of May 4, and a hearing previously set for May 5 be canceled.
“Streamlining this case — with fewer trips from California City Detention Facility to Sacramento and back — is in the best interest of the defendant, who is still recovering from his wounds,” assistant federal defender David Harshaw and assistant United States attorney Jason Hitt said in their joint filing.
