An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer charged with shooting a man and lying about it during the immigration crackdown in Minneapolis was released from a Texas jail Thursday, after a judge refused to order his return to Minnesota.
Christian Castro was released at the break of dawn from a detention center in Brownsville.
He motioned his hand toward a few camera operators and a reporter crowding around him and quickly got into an SUV that drove off.
A day earlier, U.S. District Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. wrote in an order that said he couldn’t prevent a county sheriff from releasing Castro or order Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to sign his extradition warrant.
Castro is charged in Minnesota with assault and falsely reporting a crime in the Jan. 14 shooting of 24-year-old Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis.
Castro is accused of firing gun through door of home
Castro is accused of firing a gun through the front door of a Minneapolis home, shooting Sosa-Celis in the leg. Prosecutors say Castro also falsely accused Sosa-Celis and another man of attacking an ICE officer with a broom handle and a snow shovel.
After a Minnesota judge issued a nationwide warrant for Castro’s arrest in May, authorities, including Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, arrested Castro in Cameron County on May 29.
Minnesota authorities have sought his extradition since his arrest, but he remained in custody in Brownsville, a city bordering Mexico.
Under Texas law, and barring extradition, Castro had to be released after 90 days of detention, which was Thursday.
Minnesota officials believe Castro could flee to Mexico.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed a request for a temporary restraining order last week seeking to block Castro’s release or to order his return to Minnesota.
Abbott waiting for internal state investigation about Castro --->READ MORE HERE
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Minnesota AG Keith Ellison accused Gov Greg Abbott of 'turning Texas into a sanctuary state for violent criminals'
Minnesota's progressive Attorney General Keith Ellison accused Texas Gov. Greg Abbott of turning the Lone Star State into a "sanctuary state for violent criminals" after an ICE agent charged in the shooting of a man in Minneapolis was released from a Texas jail, escalating a politically charged extradition fight between the two states.
Christian Castro, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent charged in connection with a non-fatal January shooting in Minneapolis, was released Thursday from a south Texas jail after a federal judge denied Minnesota’s emergency request to keep him in custody and compel Abbott to sign the extradition warrant. Texas law generally limits pre-extradition detention to 90 days, and Abbott has not yet decided whether to approve Minnesota’s request.
"This is not politics — this is not a game," Ellison said in a statement after Castro’s release. "If a governor can delay extraditions and cherry-pick cases according to their political tastes, then no state will be able to hold fugitive criminals accountable."
Meanwhile, Ellison wrote on X that by "refusing to extradite Castro, Greg Abbott is turning Texas into a sanctuary state for violent criminals."
"You guys are such bad lawyers. You showed up unprepared, uninformed & unpersuasive. You don't know the law & it showed," Abbott wrote on X in response to Ellison's post calling Texas a "sanctuary state for violent criminals." --->READ MORE HERE
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