BISBEE – Surveillance cameras recorded the shooting death of a Mexican immigrant by a U.S. Border Patrol Agent in Arizona, authorities said.
The shooting of Francisco Javier Dominguez Rivera, 22, was captured by a digital video camera on a U.S. Border Patrol surveillance tower, said the Cochise County Sheriff’s Office and Michael Nicley, chief of the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector.
However, Nicley said the video is not very clear.
“You can’t tell anything from the tape at all,” he said. “You can barely even make out the bodies.”
He said the Border Patrol is trying to have the tape digitally enhanced to show more detail.
Rivera was a native of the central state of Puebla. He was shot and killed during a confrontation with an unidentified agent north of the U.S.-Mexico border between Bisbee and Douglas on Jan. 12 after the agent responded to a call about a group of seven people crossing the desert. The group included Dominguez Rivera and two of his brothers.
The agent took six of the seven people into custody without incident but then started fighting with Dominguez Rivera. The agent, who thought his life was in danger, shot and killed the man, the Border Patrol said previously.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Mexico’s Foreign Relations Department condemned the shooting, and on Tuesday, the Mexican government sent a diplomatic note to the United States protesting the incident.
Cochise County and the FBI are investigating the shooting.
An autopsy of Dominguez Rivera was conducted Wednesday, but results have not been released.
The agent is on paid administrative leave while the case is pending.