MUSCATINE, Iowa — Days after he nearly died when an assailant shot him during an attempted robbery, Felipe de Jesus Hernandez Marcelo went to an Iowa police station hoping to get his belongings back.
The police in Muscatine, Iowa, had his car and the cash he carried when he was shot and nearly killed June 21. Hernandez, 28, recalled in court testimony that the department said he couldn't have those items back. Instead, police arrested him on an old warrant for failing to pay a traffic ticket.
Within hours, Hernandez was turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement . He's been detained since then pending removal proceedings, for entering the country illegally from his native Mexico in 2021.
He's is one of a growing number of crime victims and relatives arrested and indefinitely d