Federal immigration agents who shot a man Thursday with his 5-year-old son in the car in New York City were wearing body cameras that were turned on, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Friday.
Oscar Belgal, 28, is in federal immigration custody and has already been taken out of New York state into a highly secure facility, Mullin said during a press conference Friday morning. Mullin declined to say where Belgal, an undocumented immigrant from the Dominican Republic, is being held.
“Unfortunately, we are giving so much attention to this thug that was a true threat to society to the point that we had to put him into a more secure facility outside of New York,” Mullin said.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said at a press conference Thursday night that he had spoken with President Donald Trump and Mullin repeatedly, but that efforts to obtain Belgal’s release from ICE custody had been unsuccessful.
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An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot Belgal in the neck in Marble Hill, a neighborhood in northern Manhattan.
The ICE agent shot seven rounds into the car while Belgal’s 5-year-old son was inside, New York Police Department Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Thursday night, and Belgal was hospitalized shortly after the shooting.
Mullin on Friday blamed Belgal for putting the child in danger and accused him of trying to weaponize his car, a claim Trump administration officials have used to justify previous incidents of immigration officers shooting at people.
“Our officers, using their training, and believing that their life, and the life of their partners and general public were in danger, used their training and fired weapons,” Mullin said.
Agents tried to take Belgal into custody in September but did not pursue him after he fled, Mullin said. The shooting is being investigated by Homeland Security Investigations and the Federal Bureau of Investigations, Mullin confirmed.
Belgal was backing into a parking spot when a plainclothes ICE agent approached the driver’s side window with his gun drawn, Tisch said, describing NYPD surveillance camera footage. Other agents approached the car from the driver’s headlight and Belgal moved the car forward outside of the camera’s view, which did not capture the shooting, she said.
Mullin focused his comments on Belgal’s criminal history. Belgal has two prior arrests in New York City, received five years probation for a robbery in 2023 and has a pending case for criminal sale of a controlled substance, Tisch said.
Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-New York) said he met with the child and the child’s mother in the hospital Thursday. ICE agents blocked Espaillat and the family from visiting Belgal, the lawmaker said.
“The child is in good health but obviously traumatized by this whole ordeal,” Espaillat told The Washington Sun.
Espaillat said the ICE agents approached the enforcement operation in a dangerous manner, with an agent brandishing a gun.
“There’s heavy foot traffic there,” the lawmaker said. “There are schools around there, and this was about 4 p.m, so it’s a time where children and families are walking around the neighborhood.”
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