ICE officer avoids extradition for a shooting, gets indicted anyway for the six lies he told about it

…(cont) Line two: Castro sat in the Cameron County jail for roughly three months while the two states argued in court over who got him. A judge sided with Texas. On August 27th, Governor Greg Abbott declined to honor the extradition request, and Castro walked out of that jail before sunrise. Common Dreams called it playing with constitutional fire. The New York Times called it an unusual court battle. Whatever you call it, the assault case Minnesota wanted to bring never got in front of a jury, because the man never got on a plane.

Line three, and this is the one worth sitting with: two days after that release, the Times reported the federal case against Castro had stalled too. The shooting, it seemed, was not going to be anyone's problem in particular.

Then, this week, it became a very specific problem. Federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment charging Castro with six counts — not about the shooting itself, but about what he told investigators happened afterward. The indictment lays out claims prosecutors say the video does not match. The New York Times noted this marks a rare instance of the Trump administration seeking to hold one of its own immigration agents accountable for actions taken on duty. Castro has pleaded not guilty.

So follow the ball all the way through: a man is shot in Minneapolis in January. The officer is arrested in May. Two states fight over him for three months. Texas lets him go in August rather than send him north to answer for the shooting. And in September, the federal government finally holds him accountable — for the story he told about it.

The shooting itself is still, as far as the record shows, an open question between two states that couldn't agree who gets to ask it. The lying, at least, got an indictment.