MUSCATINE, Iowa (AP) — Days after an assailant’s bullet tore through two of his limbs, Felipe de Jesus Hernandez Marcelo hobbled out of the hospital on crutches.
Hernandez had nearly died in the early morning of June 21 when, police say, a troubled young man shot him during an attempted robbery in Muscatine, Iowa. A quick emergency response saved his life, but the shooting left the 28-year-old father wounded where a bullet traveled through his arm and leg.
Police had seized the car Hernandez was driving when he was shot and the $462 cash it contained as evidence. A friend took him to the police station to ask for his belongings on June 24 — not knowing the visit could mark the last time he enjoyed freedom in the United States.
Hernandez is one of a growing number of crime victims and relatives who have been arrested and indefinitely detained pending removal proceedings during the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
In January, Immigration and Customs Enforcement rescinded a policy that had shielded many victims from detention and removal. The number of people applying for visas that allow some victims and their families to remain in the country has plummeted since then. Others are being detained as they go through the lengthy application process. Of those detained, many have been declared ineligible for release under another ICE policy change.
Critics say the outcome is not only cruel to victims and their families but is harming public safety by making those who are in the U.S. illegally unlikely to report crimes and cooperate with police. “This type of thing is now the new normal. This scenario is happening every day in every city,” said Dan Kowalski, a retired attorney who has been an expert on immigration law for decades. “Any contact with any level or kind of state or federal law enforcement, civil or criminal, puts you in danger of detention by ICE.”
ICE didn’t return messages seeking comment. Its new policy cites an executive order signed by President Donald Trump, titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” which calls for the “total and efficient enforcement” of immigration laws.
A native of Mexico who entered the U.S. illegally, Hernandez has been in federal custody for all of the 2 ½ months since he visited his police station. Police arrested him on an old warrant for failing to pay a traffic ticket, and he was turned over to ICE custody within hours.
Hernandez has been apart from his 9-year-old son, unable to attend medical appointments critical for recovering from his gunshot wounds, and unable to work the construction job that paid his family’s bills. He was denied medicine for the first five days as he suffered in excruciating pain, he said.
“... It felt like forever,” Hernandez recalled this month in court testimony, before a federal judge ruled that his indefinite federal detention without a bond hearing was illegal.
It was 4 a.m. on June 21 when Hernandez cried out for help in downtown Muscatine, a city of 24,000 along the Mississippi River where he had lived with relatives since he arrived in the U.S. in 2021. Witnesses saw Hernandez behind the wheel of his Volkswagen Jetta covered in blood as he struggled to convey what happened to them in Spanish. A woman called 911, saying she believed he had been stabbed in the leg.
Officers arrived from the nearby police station in minutes, and found blood pouring out of Hernandez’s inner thigh and pooling on the seat. One wrapped a tourniquet around the wound to try to stop the blooding as Hernandez appeared to close his eyes and drift in and out of consciousness.
An ambulance took him to a nearby hospital emergency room where doctors concluded he needed to be transported 40 miles away for advanced treatment at the University of Iowa hospital. There, doctors performed a surgery to remove bullet and bone fragments and gave him blood transfusions. His lawyer says those interventions saved Hernandez’s life, but left him with him with a $27,000 hospital bill.
... When Hernandez arrived at the police station seeking his belongings, investigators were still looking for the suspects involved in his attempted robbery and shooting.
Hernandez is seeking to apply for a U visa, and would appear to be eligible as the victim of a felony assault. But the Muscatine County prosecutor has yet to certify his eligibility. Hernandez’s detention serves as a critical case study in the ongoing debate about immigrant rights and the treatment of crime victims under current immigration policies.
Hernandez had nearly died in the early morning of June 21 when, police say, a troubled young man shot him during an attempted robbery in Muscatine, Iowa. A quick emergency response saved his life, but the shooting left the 28-year-old father wounded where a bullet traveled through his arm and leg.
Police had seized the car Hernandez was driving when he was shot and the $462 cash it contained as evidence. A friend took him to the police station to ask for his belongings on June 24 — not knowing the visit could mark the last time he enjoyed freedom in the United States.
Hernandez is one of a growing number of crime victims and relatives who have been arrested and indefinitely detained pending removal proceedings during the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
In January, Immigration and Customs Enforcement rescinded a policy that had shielded many victims from detention and removal. The number of people applying for visas that allow some victims and their families to remain in the country has plummeted since then. Others are being detained as they go through the lengthy application process. Of those detained, many have been declared ineligible for release under another ICE policy change.
Critics say the outcome is not only cruel to victims and their families but is harming public safety by making those who are in the U.S. illegally unlikely to report crimes and cooperate with police. “This type of thing is now the new normal. This scenario is happening every day in every city,” said Dan Kowalski, a retired attorney who has been an expert on immigration law for decades. “Any contact with any level or kind of state or federal law enforcement, civil or criminal, puts you in danger of detention by ICE.”
ICE didn’t return messages seeking comment. Its new policy cites an executive order signed by President Donald Trump, titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” which calls for the “total and efficient enforcement” of immigration laws.
A native of Mexico who entered the U.S. illegally, Hernandez has been in federal custody for all of the 2 ½ months since he visited his police station. Police arrested him on an old warrant for failing to pay a traffic ticket, and he was turned over to ICE custody within hours.
Hernandez has been apart from his 9-year-old son, unable to attend medical appointments critical for recovering from his gunshot wounds, and unable to work the construction job that paid his family’s bills. He was denied medicine for the first five days as he suffered in excruciating pain, he said.
“... It felt like forever,” Hernandez recalled this month in court testimony, before a federal judge ruled that his indefinite federal detention without a bond hearing was illegal.
It was 4 a.m. on June 21 when Hernandez cried out for help in downtown Muscatine, a city of 24,000 along the Mississippi River where he had lived with relatives since he arrived in the U.S. in 2021. Witnesses saw Hernandez behind the wheel of his Volkswagen Jetta covered in blood as he struggled to convey what happened to them in Spanish. A woman called 911, saying she believed he had been stabbed in the leg.
Officers arrived from the nearby police station in minutes, and found blood pouring out of Hernandez’s inner thigh and pooling on the seat. One wrapped a tourniquet around the wound to try to stop the blooding as Hernandez appeared to close his eyes and drift in and out of consciousness.
An ambulance took him to a nearby hospital emergency room where doctors concluded he needed to be transported 40 miles away for advanced treatment at the University of Iowa hospital. There, doctors performed a surgery to remove bullet and bone fragments and gave him blood transfusions. His lawyer says those interventions saved Hernandez’s life, but left him with him with a $27,000 hospital bill.
... When Hernandez arrived at the police station seeking his belongings, investigators were still looking for the suspects involved in his attempted robbery and shooting.
Hernandez is seeking to apply for a U visa, and would appear to be eligible as the victim of a felony assault. But the Muscatine County prosecutor has yet to certify his eligibility. Hernandez’s detention serves as a critical case study in the ongoing debate about immigrant rights and the treatment of crime victims under current immigration policies.
