AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Venezuelan man shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer was in custody Monday at an ICE detention center in Texas after he was released from a hospital with a bullet still lodged in his back, according to a spokesperson for the man’s attorney.

Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, 28, was making a DoorDash delivery in the Texas capital of Austin on Sunday before he was shot during a traffic stop, said Fabiana Meléndez Ruiz, a spokesperson for immigration attorney Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch.

Ruiz said that Perez called his wife around 12:30 p.m. Sunday to tell her that he had been shot. She said Perez’s wife hasn’t spoken with him since then.

Perez was being detained at the South Texas ICE Processing Center in Pearsall, about 130 miles (209 kilometers) southwest of Austin, Ruiz told The Associated Press. She said Lincoln-Goldfinch spoke by phone with Perez, who told her that he was being interrogated while a bullet remained in his back. Perez also said he had no pain medication, according to Ruiz.

  • meco03211@lemmy.world
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    9 hours ago

    Not defending ICEs actions, but sometimes leaving the bullet in is best. You’ll do more damage extracting it than it will do staying there. No idea if that’s the case here, but there are times when leaving it in is appropriate.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      5 hours ago

      And that decision is made by doctors.

      Bet this guy hasn’t seen a proper doctor.

    • gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world
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      9 hours ago

      Based on the fact that the hospital refused to answer any questions from his wife until after ICE kidnapped him from their facility it seems a lot more likely that they were more concerned with not producing any evidence that might incriminate ICE agents than they were with their patient’s well-being

    • Bananskal@nord.pub
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      6 hours ago

      Yeah, I saw some medical person on YouTube who also said the same thing. One of the biggest false tropes of television and film is that you need to take the bullet out first in order to stabilize the patient. Nah, you just need to stop the bleeding, basically. The bullet doesn’t hurt you unless it’s clogging something or infected or something. The bullet most likely already did all the damage it will do on its way in.

    • frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io
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      9 hours ago

      Seems like something you’d want to monitor and discuss options with the patient as they recover. Something not happening once they leave the hospital…

    • frongt@lemmy.zip
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      9 hours ago

      In fact it usually is, until you are stable in a real hospital with a surgeon. Especially if it’s near a sensitive area like the spine. They say Abraham Lincoln might be alive today if they didn’t go rooting around in his brain, trying to extract the bullet.

      But that still doesn’t excuse any delay or denial of treatment, nor interrogation while injured.