Federal immigration officers were about a half-mile away when a man who was illegally in the U.S. crashed a car at high speed and died in Michigan last weekend, authorities said Thursday, attempting to rebut any claim that they were in hot pursuit.
The death of Mario Coronado Juarez has angered friends and activists, and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has directed state police to investigate the Sunday morning crash in Grand Rapids.
Juarez, a native of Guatemala, apparently was not the specific target of officers. But he was driving a car that was registered to another person who was also in the U.S. illegally and wanted back in Guatemala, the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.
“As officers attempted the stop to confirm the identity of the driver, the driver of the vehicle fled at a high rate of speed,” DHS said. “In the interest of public safety, ICE officers immediately discontinued the enforcement action."
“A short time later, officers saw smoke nearly half a mile from the attempted stop and discovered the vehicle had crashed into a tree and caught fire,” DHS said.
The agency said officers tried to help Juarez and put out the fire before Grand Rapids first responders arrived. Juarez, who was in his 30s, died at the scene.
ICE officers have followed and arrested people believed to be targets who turn out to be someone else. But as the agency rapidly expands with the hiring of 12,000 officers, its long-held practices are getting more scrutiny.
In Evanston, Illinois, a U.S. citizen was left bloodied on the side of the road Sunday after a confrontation with immigration officers who mistook him for a fugitive, police said. Homeland Security said the man initially refused to identify himself despite "lawful commands."
Grand Rapids Mayor David LaGrand supports a state police investigation of Juarez's death. The city police department said it had no role Sunday until called to the crash site.
“While we don’t know what Mario was thinking and feeling, we know that his death happened in the context of a national effort to create fear among our immigrant neighbors,” LaGrand said.
Juarez was supporting a wife and three children by working in construction in Grand Rapids and saving money to build a home for them in Guatemala, where they live, said Gema Lowe, an immigrant rights activist.
She led a chant of Juarez's name at a plaza outside city hall Tuesday and said he had died because of ICE's “vicious persecution of immigrant workers.”
Democratic U.S. Rep. Hillary Scholten, who represents Grand Rapids, sent a detailed letter to ICE that included a request that any video recorded by officers be preserved.