Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare says his office has collected most of the evidence in the Lorenzo Salgao Araujo case and is now determining what, if any, charges will be presented to a grand jury.
In an appearance on Hello Houston Thursday, Teare said his office was now at a "tipping point" with the evidence they've collected.
"You're never done investigating," Teare said. "We're at a point where we've gotten just about everything we are going to get. There are back pieces of evidence that we still need from the federal government that we've requested and are effectively waiting on, but we're now much more moving into the evaluation phase."
Salgado Araujo, an undocumented immigrant from Mexico who had lived in Houston since the 90s, was fatally shot by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on July 7. Days after the shooting, amid public cries for an independent investigation, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office launched its own investigation into the shooting.
Teare's office is investigating alongside the FBI and the Texas Rangers. The outstanding evidence Teare's office is seeking from federal partners includes copies of ICE reports of the incident, field operation worksheets that detail ICE agent movements, and the training records of the ICE agents involved.
"Those are things that I absolutely believe are important in an evaluation of this case, but they’re not something that is going to hinder my ability to present the facts as they occurred that day," Teare said.
Despite public demands that the ICE officer responsible for firing the shot that killed Salgado Araujo be named, Teare said his office has moved on.
"Identifying the shooter is not something we’re concerned about anymore," Teare said. "We’ve passed that. We’ve overcome that hurdle."
Harris County has approved $2.5 million dollars over the course of three years for the DA's office to investigate the case.
"We file 150,000 cases a year. We don’t typically do one like this," Teare said. "We have a team of prosecutors and investigators who are working on this every single day. This is not something that can be done quickly, but at the end of the day, it’s not something that anyone wants to be done quickly. If we miss something, we’ve got one shot at doing this the right way for everyone involved, and we are going to be methodical about the investigation and the subsequent presentation to a grand jury, and whatever comes after that."
On Friday morning, two of Salgado Araujo's sons, Ronaldo and Lorenzo Jr., joined faith leaders at the scene of the shooting to pray and make renewed calls for immigration reform and the release of their uncle Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo, who is the last witness to the shooting and who still remains in ICE detention. Two other men who were in Salgado Araujo's vehicle at the time of the shooting, Jose Rojas Trinidae Pliego and Daniel Pantoja, have been released following separate orders from federal judges. The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas,Aaron Reitz,is expected to appeal both of their releases.
"We really appreciate learning about the prospective grand jury decision — it shows there is progress being done," Lorenzo Jr. said. "It makes us happy things are moving in the right direction in that regard.
The brothers added they hope the news of a grand jury will mean their uncle Victor will soon be released from detention so he can participate and share his account. Victor has been held in detention for 53 days and his nephews say he isn't sleeping or eating well while in custody.
"Every time [Victor] closes his eyes, he sees the event — you know, what happened that morning," Ronaldo said in Spanish. "And whenever a door slams shut, he gets startled, like it's a gunshot."
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