--- title: "Seven rounds into a car in Marble Hill, with a five-year-old inside" description: "An ICE officer shot a 28-year-old man during an arrest in New York; by night agents had taken him from hospital and the mayor’s calls had failed" author: "Jan Sokol" published: 2026-10-09T05:01:36Z modified: 2026-10-09T09:31:40Z url: https://rews.cc/a/seven-rounds-into-a-car-in-marble-hill-with-a-five-year-old--c17fb3 language: en tags: ["immigration", "police", "trump", "ice", "protests", "us"] publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)" --- # Seven rounds into a car in Marble Hill, with a five-year-old inside *An ICE officer shot a 28-year-old man during an arrest in New York; by night agents had taken him from hospital and the mayor’s calls had failed* By Jan Sokol · October 9, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/seven-rounds-into-a-car-in-marble-hill-with-a-five-year-old--c17fb3 ## In brief - An ICE officer shot a 28-year-old man in his car in Marble Hill, New York, on 8 October; a five-year-old in the car was unharmed - NYPD Commissioner Tisch said at least seven rounds were fired and the man was hit in the neck; NYPD was not on scene - DHS called it a targeted arrest of a Dominican man with a criminal record but did not explain why the officer fired - Mayor Mamdani said talks with Trump and Secretary Mullin to free the man failed and ICE removed him from hospital - Protests spread to the hospital; Reuters counts at least 21 people shot by immigration agents since Trump returned, 7 fatally Marble Hill is an oddity of New York geography: legally part of Manhattan, physically attached to the Bronx. That is why Thursday’s shooting, 8 October, landed in one borough in some reports and in the other borough elsewhere. At around four in the afternoon, on a residential street there, federal immigration agents surrounded a car with a man and a five-year-old child inside. Then they fired. “Early reports indicate agents surrounded (the man) and a 5-year-old child in his car before firing multiple rounds,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a statement, [as Reuters reported](https://yahoo.com/news/us/articles/person-wounded-york-shooting-involving-224811769.html). Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch later gave the count. At least one ICE agent fired seven rounds, she said, and the man was hit in the neck “just below his left ear,” [according to amNY](https://www.amny.com/immigration/ice-shooting-mamdani-trump-marble-hill-10092026/). Police recovered at least seven shell casings. The windshield was damaged and the rear window shattered. The boy, believed to be the man’s son, was physically unharmed. After a wellness check the NYPD found him with a family member. ## What the street saw Pedro Almarez was working at a nearby restaurant when he heard the shots. He went outside and saw several officers in ICE attire. “There were a lot of ICE officers, three or four cars,” he told Reuters. He said city police came about ten minutes later, and that the man was not taken out of his car until an ambulance arrived. A witness [told *The Guardian*’s](https://theguardian.com/us-news/2026/oct/08/nyc-shooting-federal-agent) sources at the City Reporter, a local outlet, that she saw a man bleeding on the ground in front of a car and an agent holding a small child. Cellphone video published by the *New York Times* appeared to show an agent in a yellow vest holding what looked like an assault rifle while talking on the phone. NY1 reported that videos showed bullet holes in the windshield of an SUV. Tisch drew a clear line around her own force: “the NYPD had no involvement in the federal operation prior to the shooting, and no members of the NYPD were on scene.” ## The grammar of the statement The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, said its officers had been conducting a “targeted enforcement operation” to arrest a man from the Dominican Republic with a prior criminal conviction. [Al Jazeera reported](https://aljazeera.com/news/2026/10/9/ice-agent-shoots-man-in-car-with-five-year-old-child-in-new-york-mayor) that DHS described the man as an arrest target. Its account of the shooting itself was one sentence long: “During the incident, an ICE officer discharged his weapon and the criminal illegal alien was injured.” In that sentence the weapon discharges and the man is injured. Nobody pulls a trigger. This is how institutions often write about their own violence, in the passive voice. The statement did not say what led to the shooting, or whether the man was armed. It said more about the man. [As quoted by PIX11](https://pix11.com/news/dhs-issues-statement-on-marble-hill-ice-shooting-blaming-radical-sanctuary-politicians/), DHS cited a grand larceny conviction, prior arrests for assault, robbery, drug possession and weapons possession, and “associations” with the Trinitarios gang. It blamed his release after a December 2023 arrest on sanctuary policies. DHS gave no evidence and did not name him. The department has previously had to retract false accusations that immigrants shot by agents were gang members. Tisch said the 28-year-old had been arrested twice in New York, in 2023 and 2025. [NBC News](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/person-shot-ice-officers-new-york-city-rcna602413), citing four law enforcement sources and court records, identified him as Oscar Belgal. DHS said its officers “rendered immediate aid.” [amNY, citing its own sources](https://www.amny.com/police-fire/ice-agents-shot-person-bronx-10082026/), reported something different: that NYPD officers helped the man and drove him in a police car to NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital. That outlet also reported that the federal statement came out nearly four and a half hours after the shooting. ## Negotiating for a wounded man Mamdani’s [first statement](https://www.nyc.gov/mayors-office/news/2026/10/mayor-zohran-kwame-mamdani-releases-statement-on-ice-shooting-) called it “an unconscionable and incredibly serious situation” and promised that he would demand the president end all ICE enforcement in the city. It closed with two words: “Abolish ICE.” Late that night he told reporters how things stood. “I have been on the phone with President Trump and (Homeland Security) Secretary Mullin, negotiating the release of the man ICE agents shot. Those negotiations were unsuccessful.” According to amNY, he then said: “Just moments ago, ICE put the man in an unmarked vehicle and whisked him away.” It was not clear where he had been taken. The mayor of a city of millions had called the head of state to ask for one wounded man, and was refused. Governments usually conduct that kind of bargaining across borders. Governor Kathy Hochul made her own calls to the same two men. She said she had “urged them to halt ICE enforcement operations in New York” and asked that body camera footage be released “so we can establish the facts.” ## The crowd Protesters started arriving soon after the shots, many off the 1 train. Their signs read “Jail all killer ICE agents” and “Leave our neighbors alone.” At an emergency press conference held by Hands Off NYC and the New York Immigration Coalition, Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson said: “We are a working-class community. We don’t deserve this type of treatment from the White House.” Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said: “Those of us who have more privilege – we must take more risk to protect those who don’t.” The crowd moved on to the hospital. Police put up barricades there and protesters clashed with officers, while drums beat and passing cars honked. Murad Awawdeh, president of the coalition, called for an independent investigation led by New York officials, release of the footage and prosecution of the officer. “The pain that you’re witnessing is people who are witnessing their neighbors, their family members, their friends being ripped away,” he said. ## A pattern with a count The two counts of shootings by immigration agents since Donald Trump returned to office differ. Reuters puts it at at least 21 people shot, seven of them fatally. *The Guardian*, citing one analysis, says at least two dozen, including three US citizens who were killed. Last month an officer in Texas shot Wilber Rafael Garcés Pérez, 28, during a traffic stop. Prosecutors then [charged him with assault](https://rews.cc/a/u-s-charges-venezuelan-migrant-shot-by-an-ice-agent-in-austi-2d67f1), alleging he struck an officer with his side mirror. The administration often says drivers have “weaponized” their cars. A *Guardian* analysis in July found that most such claims had fallen apart under scrutiny. ICE arrests are at record levels. The agency has moved away from last year’s high-profile raids and now sends agents into neighborhoods more quietly. On Thursday, as police taped off a city block in Marble Hill, a woman on a balcony above shouted down to the officers that they were “taking our children.” ## Sources - [ICE shooting of New York man in car with five-year-old sparks protests](https://aljazeera.com/news/2026/10/9/ice-agent-shoots-man-in-car-with-five-year-old-child-in-new-york-mayor) — aljazeera.com - [New York City man shot in car with child present by ICE agents, mayor says](https://yahoo.com/news/us/articles/person-wounded-york-shooting-involving-224811769.html) — yahoo.com - [ICE agent shoots man in New York City with five-year-old reportedly in car](https://theguardian.com/us-news/2026/oct/08/nyc-shooting-federal-agent) — theguardian.com