ARLINGTON, Va. — Jose Mejia Hernandez on Friday filed a police report saying he is the victim of a crime, alleging that two ICE officers beat him and left him bleeding with an injury to his brain.
Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones told Carlos Jurado, an attorney for Mejia Hernandez, that his office would not investigate the claims unless he filed a police report, Jurado told HuffPost. Jones did not immediately return a request for comment.
Mejia Hernandez said he was walking toward a bus stop on his way to work early on Aug. 11 when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers burst from a vehicle and started to chase him. He did not have a removal order at the time, and it is unclear why ICE pursued him.
The 45-year-old — standing 4 feet, 11 inches and weighing just 125 pounds — recalls being shocked with a Taser. But what ensued was a blur of confusion and terror, and Mejia Hernandez’s memory of the moments before he was allegedly assaulted was “blank,” his attorney told HuffPost. He awoke to blunt-force trauma to his head and upper body. His face was lacerated and his head swollen. Doctors later diagnosed him with a brain hemorrhage, Jurado said.
Mejia Hernandez claims that when he awoke in a hospital in Virginia, medical staff were cagey about his condition, and no one attempted to contact his family and let them know he had been detained, injured and hospitalized. His attorney said Mejia Hernandez only learned how badly he had been injured when a Spanish-speaking nurse whispered it to him.
In the hospital, Mejia Hernandez said ICE officers kept close watch on him, did not leave his room and barred him from talking to medical staff.
He was discharged 72 hours later, fitted with an ankle monitor and ordered to appear before an immigration judge. Jurado said Mejia Hernandez, suffering headaches and in severe pain, was then forced to spend days shuffling between immigration offices and doctors’ offices to negotiate the removal of his ankle monitor so he could receive an MRI and complete a full medical evaluation. The ankle monitor was eventually removed for an MRI, but that took days, Jurado said.
The Department of Homeland Security has denied any wrongdoing and called the allegations that its officers assaulted Mejia Hernandez false.
In the police report filed Friday and shared with HuffPost, Mejia Hernandez asks to be interviewed by a detective and for law enforcement to investigate whether charges should be filed, including attempted murder, aggravated malicious wounding, malicious wounding, failure of a driver involved in an accident causing injury to stop, ID themselves or render assistance, reckless driving, and assault and battery.
“That the suspects may be federal officers is not a reason to decline the report. It is a reason to take it carefully. Virginia’s criminal law protects everyone standing on a sidewalk in Arlington, and the Department’s duty to document a reported felony does not turn on who the suspect works for,” attorney Denisse Gastelum wrote in a letter requesting the investigation by Arlington County Police.
Mejia Hernandez’s lawyers want police to examine every government vehicle on the scene on Aug. 11 for impact damage, blood and hair. They have asked that the vehicles be extensively photographed and that law enforcement obtain any GPS or maintenance records on the cars, too.
Any body-worn camera footage or recordings on ICE officers’ personal or work devices should be reviewed, as should any radio dispatches, Gastelum wrote.
Lawyers are also demanding the names of ICE officers on duty and details about what their “operational plan” was meant to be on the morning Mejia Hernandez was assaulted. Hospital records should also be secured, the incident report notes.
“Civilian eyewitnesses” who “fear retaliation” filmed the moments after the alleged assault, the incident report states.
The videos, which were shared with HuffPost, depict a dazed, bleeding and visibly confused Mejia Hernandez. As he tries to sit up, he touches his mouth and face; he cannot manage to stand alone. An officer appears to help him stand up, though Mejia Hernandez is clearly wobbly, unsure of his footing and breathing heavily.
Arlington County Police did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment.