The Dominican man shot by an immigration agent in Marble Hill was arrested without a valid warrant and is being held in solitary confinement without proper medical care, according to a new court filing submitted by his attorneys Wednesday afternoon.
Oscar Belgal had just picked up his son from school then taken him to McDonald’s when plainclothes Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents rushed his car and fired at least seven shots, striking him in the neck.
Belgal identified an “anonymous, masked man,” who first approached his drivers-side window with a gun drawn, The Legal Aid Society wrote in court papers.The agent then “struck and shattered Oscar’s window and began firing a pistol into Oscar’s car while his son cowered in the back seat.”
Video of the incident released by the New York Police Department, shows a man in a grey sweatshirt and a red hat as the first to approach Belgal’s SUV and bang on the window. The identity of the shooter has still not been confirmed by federal authorities.
“After ICE shot him, Oscar exited his vehicle and pleaded for medical assistance, fearing that he was dying. And believing the same, his son began yelling that the masked individuals had killed his dad,” the petition reads.
Belgal lost consciousness, his attorneys said, and it wasn’t until Belgal awoke at NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital a few blocks away that the men told him they were ICE agents, his attorneys said.
Attorneys Perry Hall McAninch and Elyssa Nicole Williams with Legal Aid submitted the new details about the shooting in an amended habeas corpus petition filed in New York’s Eastern District on Wednesday afternoon.
They described Belgal as a 28-year-old father of two who works in construction and has lived in New York City for five years. His 5-year-old son was in the back seat at the time of the shooting. His other child is 1 year old, Legal Aid said.
“ICE’s egregious actions violate fundamental principles of every legal structure that constrains its conduct and authority — the Constitution, the statutory and regulatory framework, and even its own internal policies,” the petition reads, describing ICE’s, “flagrant abuses of authority and categorically lawless conduct” during Belgal’s arrest.
The petition charged ICE with violating federal laws and Belgal’s constitutional rights by continuing to deny him medical care, and because they didn’t have a valid administrative arrest warrant when they attempted to arrest him and shot him in the neck.
“ICE now holds Oscar in a segregated unit at MDC [Metropolitan Detention Center]. With the bullet still lodged in his neck, the entire left side of Oscar’s face remains numb,” the filing reads. “He struggles to hear anything out of his left ear, describing what he does hear as sounding as if it were far off in the distance. Meanwhile, jail staff offer him only ibuprofen for his pain.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately return a request for comment regarding the assertions.
‘No Evidence of Those Allegations’
The new details come six days after the daylight shooting that rattled the immigrant community of Marble Hill on a busy afternoon, as schools let out and people were returning from work.
In the minutes after the shooting, eyewitness photos and videos show Belgal sitting on the pavement of 225th Street until he was lifted by NYPD officers into a squad car and driven to the nearby Allen Hospital.
The shooting drew swift rebuke from New York’s elected officials and massive protests in the city. Mayor Zohran Mamdani tried to negotiate Belgal’s release from ICE custody during a two-hour phone call the night of the shooting with President Donald Trump and Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin.
Late Thursday evening, ICE agents moved Belgal from the hospital to New Jersey, and then to MDC in Brooklyn the next day. He is still being held in solitary confinement, according to his attorneys.
In an agreement with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, ICE has held around 200 of its detainees at any given time at MDC since early on in Trump’s second term on units separate from prisoners facing federal charges.
Belgal’s shooting is the second such instance in a month in which a person shot by ICE was discharged from a hospital within hours of injury with a bullet still in his body. In late September, delivery driver Wilber Rafael Garcés Pérez waited 11 days for surgery after he was shot by an ICE agent in Austin, Texas.
Belgal’s doctors said he was supposed to return to the hospital for a surgery to remove the bullet from his neck on Oct. 12, but that trip never happened, according to the court filing.
A spokesperson for the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP), which oversees MDC said the agency doesn’t comment on individual cases but denied any medical malfeasance.
“The Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) does not deny any inmate necessary medical treatment or basic necessities, such as access to three meals per day, drinking water, clothing, or daily access to medical and psychological care,” the agency said in an unsigned statement.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said they deliberately targeted Belgal for arrest, citing his prior criminal history and alleging he had ties to the Dominican Trinitarios gang. Criminal court records show he was previously convicted for grand larceny and has an open case for allegedly selling drugs.
But in their new filing Wednesday, Belgal’s attorneys argued ICE has provided no evidence of gang ties.
“Oscar vehemently denies involvement with any gang or organized criminal organization,” his attorneys wrote.
Furthermore, they dispute that Belgal’s arrest was targeted, arguing there was no administrative arrest warrant at the time of the shooting.
Belgal was not in immigration proceedings before his arrest, and DHS only issued paperwork requesting he appear in immigration court on the day after his arrest, his attorneys said. The issuing of a “Notice to Appear” is supposed to occur before an administrative arrest warrant is issued in order for the arrest to be valid, according to the federal Immigration and Nationality Act.
Since the shooting last week, hundreds of protesters have marched for his release. Another crowd rallied outside MDC where Belgal was being held Tuesday night.
“I can’t imagine having a bullet in your neck, after being shot in front of your child, picking them up from school, in solitary confinement,” New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said outside MDC. “That’s what’s happening right now and everyone of good conscience should be disgusted that that’s happening to Oscar.”
