Francisco Longoria, a San Bernardino man who was driving his truck when a masked U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer shot at it, has been arrested and charged by federal authorities. They allege he assaulted immigration officers during the incident.
In a statement, Longoria’s attorneys said Homeland Security Investigations agents arrived at the Longoria household at 4:18 a.m. Thursday, with an armored personnel carrier, a type of military vehicle, and deployed more than a dozen “fully armed and armored” agents to swarm the home, breaking the locks on his gate. An agent called out to Longoria to come out, using a bullhorn, as agents stood at each door and pointed their rifles at the door and at the occupants inside, the attorneys said.
“These are the type of tactics reserved for dangerous criminals such as violent gang members, drug lords and terrorists,” the attorneys said. “It was clearly intended to intimidate and punish Mr. Longoria and his family for daring to speak out about their attempted murder by [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] and CBP agents on August 16th.”
On that day, federal immigration officers stopped Longoria in San Bernardino. During the encounter, Longoria, who was in his truck with his 18-year-old son and 23-year-old son-in-law, feared for his safety and drove off after masked officers shattered his car window, his attorneys said.
Department of Homeland Security officials have said officers were injured during the encounter when Longoria tried to “run them down.” Longoria’s attorneys dispute their client injured the officers or attempted to hit them, and earlier this week they called for an investigation of the shooting.
On Friday morning, the U.S. attorney’s office confirmed that Homeland Security Investigations agents arrested Longoria the day before. Word of his arrest was earlier reported by the San Bernardino Sun.
Ciaran McEvoy, spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles, said Longoria made an initial appearance before a U.S. District Court judge in Riverside, and is set to be arraigned on Sept. 30. The federal magistrate judge ordered him released on a $5,000 bond.
Longoria was being held at the San Bernardino County Jail, in custody of the U.S. Marshals Service, as of Thursday afternoon, McEvoy said in an email.
“Since Longoria is an illegal alien, ICE has a detainer on him,” he said. Longoria’s attorneys said their client was transferred into ICE custody as of Friday.
An unnamed Department of Homeland Security spokesperson confirmed federal agents arrested Longoria at his home.
“CBP and ICE remain committed to enforcing the law, protecting officers, and keeping dangerous criminals off America’s streets — even as local officials in California undermine those efforts,” the official said.
According to a criminal complaint submitted by a Homeland Security Investigations agent, whose name is redacted, Longoria is facing a charge of assault on a federal officer with a deadly/dangerous weapon.
In the complaint, the agent, who interviewed the officers who stopped Longoria, said the officers had stopped Longoria’s GMC pickup truck to conduct “an immigration check.” Two of them were ICE officers and the other two were CBP officers.
The complaint states that the officers were identifiable by their visible clothing marked with “police.”
After they stopped Longoria’s truck, the complaint states, he refused to comply with the demands to turn off his vehicle and roll down the window. One of the CBP officers, identified as J.C., decided to break the window after Longoria refused the commands, and was allegedly struck by the driver’s door on his left elbow and left calf. The passenger-side window was also shattered by officers during the encounter.
Another CBP officer was allegedly struck by the front bumper/fender of the truck on his right leg. “The Truck kept pushing Officer S.T., and Officer S.T. shot at the Truck, afraid for his life,” according to the complaint.
Longoria’s attorneys had previously released surveillance video of the incident, which appears to dispute a key claim by Homeland Security — that Longoria drove his truck toward officers and injured them.
In the surveillance video, the moment Longoria drives away, officers on both sides of the truck remain in sight of the video, and they then pile into their vehicles and pursue Longoria’s truck down a side street.
After Longoria drove off, the family called 911. While San Bernardino police were questioning Longoria, the immigration officers arrived, and family members identified the one they believed had shot at the truck.
At the initial court appearance, the judge questioned the assistant U.S. attorney prosecuting the case, Cory Burleson, about the government’s claim that it was conducting an “immigration check,” a term he couldn’t clarify when asked by the court, according to Longoria’s attorneys.
Burleson also claimed Longoria was stopped because of a traffic violation, but couldn’t identify the violation, his attorneys said. When the judge asked Burleson to identify the alleged injuries of the officers, Burleson said he was “not aware of any injuries,” Longoria’s attorneys said.
Longoria’s attorneys said their client was granted bond, but because of the ICE hold, has since been transferred into ICE custody, which they believe is the “true purpose of this false and baseless charge.”
“No reasonable prosecutor could believe that a conviction would be secured against Mr. Longoria for the August 16th stop, when every video supports Mr. Longoria’s version of events and directly contradicts DHS’ story,” his attorneys said. “Yet [the Department of Justice] will not drop the charges; it has been their practice during this administration to pursue charges based on unsubstantiated and false affidavits in order to arrest individuals and then turn them over to ICE.”
His attorneys said they intend to continue advocating for Longoria, his son and son-in-law.
“We are in contact with local and state authorities and are encouraging a state investigation and criminal charges against the ICE/CBP agents,” the attorneys said.
Javier Hernandez, executive director of the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice, said he believes the officers had racially profiled Longoria when they stopped his truck. Originally from Mexico, Longoria migrated to the U.S. 23 years ago and had no criminal record and was not in deportation proceedings before the incident. Southern California has been Longoria’s home ever since he migrated, Hernandez said.
Even though Longoria was not detained after the initial stop, Hernandez said he had warned the family that the government would continue to pursue a case against him and use Longoria as an example to push the limits of what they can get away with. The government, he said, is “now escalating their tactics in a war against immigrants.”
“It’s a political arrest at this point,” Hernandez said. “We know that the federal government wants to make a point and instill fear in immigrant communities, and this is one of their many tactics in doing that.”
This article is part of The Times’ equity reporting initiative, funded by the James Irvine Foundation, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to address California’s economic divide.
