ICE Agent Shoots Man in NYC Car With 5-Year-Old, Sparking Protests

**Updated 08:36 UTC — Developing story.**

NEW YORK — A federal immigration officer shot and wounded a 28-year-old man inside his car in the Bronx on Thursday afternoon while a five-year-old boy, believed to be his son, sat in the back seat, city police said. The child was not hurt.

The shooting happened around 4 p.m. in the Marble Hill neighborhood of northern Manhattan as Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents moved to arrest the man in what the Department of Homeland Security called a "targeted enforcement operation." The New York Police Department identified the wounded man as Oscar Belgal, a Dominican national.

NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at least one immigration officer fired seven rounds, striking Belgal in the neck below his left ear. Tisch said NYPD surveillance cameras captured Belgal backing a gray Honda CR-V into a parking space on Marble Hill Avenue when a plainclothes federal officer approached the driver's-side window with a gun drawn. When the vehicle began moving forward, at least one officer opened fire, she said. The NYPD was not part of the federal operation and arrived only after reports of shots.

DHS said its agents were trying to arrest a "criminal illegal alien" with a grand larceny conviction and prior arrests for assault, robbery, and drug and weapons offenses, and alleged ties to the Trinitarios gang. The agency did not explain what prompted the shooting, saying only that "during the incident, an ICE officer discharged his weapon." DHS said officers rendered aid at the scene and that the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations were on site.

Belgal was taken to NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital in stable condition and is expected to survive, police said. The five-year-old boy was placed with a relative.

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside the hospital Thursday night, chanting "ICE off our streets" and "No justice, no peace." Tensions rose as police set up barricades; officers and protesters shoved each other and some demonstrators threw water bottles at police. The NYPD said at least five protesters were taken into custody early Friday.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani called the shooting "unconscionable" and demanded that any body-camera footage be released publicly "so we can establish the facts and get to the truth." He said he spent two hours on the phone with President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin pressing for the wounded man's release from federal custody, without success. "ICE put the man in an unmarked vehicle and whisked him away," Mamdani said, calling the agency "rotten to the core" and saying it "must be abolished."

"There is no explanation for federal officers firing this many rounds into a car that has a 5-year-old in the car," the mayor said.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The incident remains under investigation. Tisch stressed that the NYPD had no role in the federal operation before the shooting.