Video shows Border Patrol car hitting man on Tohono O’odham Nation
Jun 17, 2018, 2:08 PM | Updated: Jun 21, 2018, 1:57 pm
(Screenshot)
(Screenshot)
PHOENIX — A video has recently made the rounds on the internet of a Border Patrol vehicle appearing to hit and run over a man on the Tohono O’odham Nation in southern Arizona.
The 37-second video starts with the cameraman running across a dirt road that the vehicle starts to drive on. The vehicle then continues driving in the man’s direction at a decent rate of speed.
The car can be seen knocking down the man and continues to drive away as the man says the license plate of the vehicle aloud.
“They just ran me over, bro,” the man could be heard saying to a person off-camera.
It appears the car could have driven around the man if need be, and the man does not appear to say or make any type of threat toward the officer.
The video was viewed more than a million times on Facebook, and thousands of times on Twitter.
The Arizona Daily Star identified the man in the video as Paulo Remes, a resident of the Tohono O’odham Nation.
Remes told the publication that he was treated for minor bruising after the incident, which occurred near Topowa, a village that is about 10 miles south of Sells, Arizona.
“I’m doing all right, I’m just a little sore, really,” Remes said Friday.
He said he was outside looking for a speaker to listen to music when he spotted the vehicle and decided to step into the road and start filming.
“I ran into the dirt road in front of my house, because I know they’ll try and hit me,” he told the publication.
Remes said the agent, who has not been identified, turned on the vehicle’s sirens after the incident, but did not stop to check on him.
“What I think he did was turn on the sirens to get away from the scene of the crime,” he said.
The Border Patrol told the publication that it is cooperating with a tribal investigation, but did not say whether it was conducting an internal investigation.
