ICE officer indicted on allegations he ran over undocumented Mexican immigrant released on bond
By Emma Tucker, Isa Mudannayake, CNN
(CNN) — The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer accused of running over an undocumented immigrant from Mexico with a vehicle was released on a $30,000 bond Monday after appearing in court for a bond hearing, according to his attorney.
A grand jury indicted Mario Alberto Morales Friday on a charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon after he allegedly struck the man, causing multiple leg fractures. Morales’ next court hearing is set for December 2, according to his attorney David Lindenmuth.
Morales was driving an ICE vehicle, a Jeep Grand Cherokee, near Houston on October 10 when he started to pursue a vehicle driven by Miguel Parra Hernandez, an ICE spokesperson said. Parra Hernandez, who has lived in Harris County for more than 30 years, has no criminal record and had no deportation order at the time of the incident, Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare said at a news conference Friday.
Parra Hernandez, 48, and another occupant in the vehicle with him began to flee on foot after Morales pursued their vehicle, Teare said. “What happened next shocked our entire community,” the district attorney said before playing video he said showed Morales striking Parra Hernandez with his vehicle.
ICE said it “immediately contacted EMS and provided aid” to Parra Hernandez. The agency claimed Parra Hernandez “ran in front of an ICE vehicle,” which Teare said contradicts findings of his investigation.
An ICE spokesperson called the allegations that Morales struck Parra Hernandez intentionally “RECKLESS and FALSE” in a statement to The Associated Press, adding local officials are not authorized to investigate federal officers following their duties.
The indictment, obtained by CNN, alleges Morales “intentionally, knowingly, and recklessly” caused serious bodily injury to Parra Hernandez “by striking the Complainant with a motor vehicle.”
When contacted by CNN for comment on the indictment and the district attorney’s comments about Morales, a DHS spokesperson responded: “What makes someone a target for immigration enforcement is whether or not they are in the United States illegally—period.”
“I’ve reviewed hundreds of cases, some very similar to this,” Teare said at the news conference, citing his background leading the division in the office responsible for prosecuting vehicular crimes. “The evidence that we have in this case is as clear as any I’ve ever prosecuted or investigated,” he added.
Lindenmuth said the DA’s case against his client amounts to “political prosecution” and “character assassination.”
“When you don’t have the evidence, you attack the person’s character, so they’re trying to make him a monster. They’re trying to make him the face of ICE, because that’s their best chance to get a conviction,” the attorney told CNN on Monday.
The attorney said he believed the incident was an “accident” and claimed his client did not commit a crime.
Morales is a former corrections officer, pastor and military veteran who filed to run for Texas’ 34th Congressional District in 2025 and later dropped out, Lindenmuth said. He said Morales was contracted by ICE as a transportation officer.
The consequences of the incident have been “devastating and horrible” for Parra Hernandez, leaving him with life-threatening injuries, his attorney Kim Bruno said at a separate news conference Friday.
“He has suffered fractures, nerve damage, and has had surgery, and continues to face mobility limitations and chronic pain,” Bruno said, adding he has also suffered from anxiety and depression since the incident.
After a three-hour conversation with her client on Thursday, Bruno said, “All he wants is accountability,” and “assurance that this will not happen to anybody else. He is so sympathetic, and all he cares about are the other people, but he’s the one in the bed suffering.”
ICE pursued wrong man, DA says
The other occupant in the car with Parra Hernandez was identified by ICE as Jose Mendoza-Cervantes, who the agency said was the target of the operation. But Teare said the man by that name has been “apparently dead for nine years” and did not identify the other man with Parra Hernandez inside the vehicle.
In a previous interview with CNN, Parra Hernandez’s brother said the other man in the truck was not Mendoza-Cervantes, the person ICE said it was trying to arrest. “We don’t know him,” said Rodolfo Parra Garcia. “The person ICE was looking for was not the person with my brother.”
Parra Hernandez was on his way to work at a nearby construction site with another man and had just gotten water from a nearby gas station when ICE officers started the enforcement action, his brother said.
“My heart broke, seeing my brother lying in a bed without being a criminal,” Parra Garcia said.
Parra Hernandez was still in the hospital on October 25, according to a GoFundMe page created by his brother.
The incident is one of several examples involving federal agents where witness accounts and video footage have at times contradicted the federal account of what transpired, such as the fatal shooting of US citizen Renee Good in Minneapolis.
It also comes amid heightened scrutiny over vehicle stops in immigration enforcement operations after two immigrants, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston and Joan Sebastian Durán Guerrero in Biddeford, Maine, were fatally shot in July by ICE officers in separate incidents about a week apart.
Morales “aggressively steered his vehicle into Parra Hernandez,” Teare said, leaving him “seriously injured and hospitalized to this day” before calling 911 to report the Mexican national had “hit his car.”
In the 911 call played by Teare during the news conference, Morales told dispatch: “We’re following this guy, trying to pull him over. He jumped out of the vehicle. I tried to get around him and he hit my car.”
In the audio of the call, Parra Hernandez can be heard crying out after the incident.
Body camera and surveillance video footage of the incident was also displayed during the news conference, showing the moment Morales allegedly struck the man with the vehicle as well as the aftermath when Parra Hernandez was on the ground.
Parra Hernandez’s attorney said the video footage of the incident tells “a different story than what was offered” by ICE, showing her client “running away from the vehicle and not in front of the vehicle.”
Surveillance video previously reviewed by CNN appeared to show the two men jumping out of a white pickup truck and running away as the ICE vehicle accelerated and hit Parra Hernandez as he fled on foot, but the video did not clearly show the moment of impact.
“Prosecutors synced up surveillance video from a local business with the ICE officer’s body camera footage from the incident, and just before Parra Hernandez is struck by the SUV, we see the officer make a hard left turn, steering the heavy vehicle toward the man,” said Josh Campbell, CNN Senior Correspondent and former FBI Supervisory Special Agent.
“There isn’t a law enforcement agency in this country that permits its officers to use a vehicle as a deadly weapon against someone who poses no imminent threat,” Campbell added.
Even before the strike, Campbell said there were numerous questionable tactics employed by the ICE officer, which appear to mirror other controversial immigration enforcement encounters of late.
“The officer is in an unmarked SUV, with no emergency warning lights flashing as he barrels over a traffic median. We also learned from local authorities that the whole time the ICE officer was chasing Parra Hernandez, there were two other prisoners from unrelated arrests in the back of his SUV not seat-belted in.”
In early October, CNN reported on new internal agency guidance, which said ICE officers would be allowed to conduct vehicle stops only if they have completed related training courses and must ensure vehicles used for stops are equipped with lights and sirens.
ICE officer was a ‘surge’ hire last year
Morales was one of the “surge hires” by ICE in August 2025 and Teare’s office has not received any training records, he said during the news conference.
Without being able to go into detail regarding the officer’s past work history, Teare said: “I can unequivocally tell you that I’ve reviewed thousands of job applications and resumes for law enforcement officers from around this state, and I’m not familiar with a single agency that would have hired this person, based on his past.”
It’s not the first time Teare’s office has investigated a federal law enforcement officer for allegedly injuring or killing members of his community. The case against Morales shares similarities with the investigation into the fatal ICE shooting of Salgado Araujo in his van in July, Teare said.
“In all honesty, this was not even in the back of my mind that I would be having to investigate multiple instances of federal officers harming our community members,” Teare said.
As CNN reported, a byproduct of President Donald Trump’s nationwide surge has been a ramped-up effort to hire more immigration agents while slashing in half the amount of time they are trained before hitting the streets, Campbell said.
“Federal law enforcement officers have incredible powers,” Campbell said, “which include the powers to deny someone their liberty and even legally kill someone who might present a threat. The public expects that anyone hired to carry out the duties of a federal agent will be someone with exceptional judgment who is provided intensive training before being given a badge and gun.”
Evidence in case against Morales is clear, DA says
Teare stressed his office’s “utmost respect and admiration for law enforcement,” adding all local, state and federal officers should be properly vetted, trained and expected to follow standard law enforcement practices, especially as it relates to vehicle pursuits and stops.
“An ICE badge does not give you free rein to injure, kill, or violate the constitutional rights of anyone,” Teare said, adding he hopes the prosecution of Morales sends a “loud and clear message to every ICE officer who feels they have a free pass to terrorize our streets.”
At the news conference, Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said investigators at his office gathered video evidence, interviewed witnesses and worked closely with prosecutors to establish the circumstances surrounding the incident.
Investigators “developed serious concerns about the actions of the agent involved” and the office presented the findings of the investigation to the district attorney, Gonzalez said.
“Behind every investigation is a human being whose life has been affected, and we should never lose sight of that,” the sheriff added.
CNN’s Lauren Mascarenhas contributed to this report.
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