Indicted ICE officer had been on the job a little over a year as Trump’s hiring surge comes under scrutiny

ICE officer Mario Alberto Morales turned himself in on Monday after being indicted last week in connection with running over a man who was on foot. The case has put Morales’ work record under scrutiny and called attention to the administration’s hiring surge last year to fill in immigration enforcement posts.

Morales, 33, was released on a $30,000 bond after a hearing before District Court Judge Matthew Peneguy in Harris County, Texas. He had been indicted Friday on a second-degree felony charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

The case has escalated criticism of the administration’s attempt to quickly increase the ranks of ICE officers to fulfill President Donald Trump’s mass deportation pledge, just as voters are heading to the polls for midterm elections.

Last year, several Department of Homeland Security officials told NBC News some of the ICE recruits had failed to meet the standards for hire, including having disqualifying criminal backgrounds or lacking physical or academic requirements. The DHS told NBC News at the time that most of its new recruits are former law enforcement officers.

Earlier this month, the agency said it would be retraining thousands of its officers who had received expedited training due to the hiring surge.

The Oct. 10 incident involving Morales and Miguel Parra Hernandez was captured by several cameras. Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare said the footage led investigators to believe that Morales deliberately ran over Parra to stop him during a chase.

Parra is in rehabilitation, overseen by ICE officers, recovering from multiple injuries.

If a similar incident occurred in a Harris County agency, Teare told NBC News on Monday, “every one of those people, whether or not they had gotten into any trouble or not, would be taken off the street and sent back through the full academy.”

Morales was hired by ICE in August 2025 and had more training than other hires, his attorney, David Lindenmuth, said. He accused Teare of character assassination.

“This Democratic district attorney has great issues with the conservative Republican Party government’s ICE agenda, and he’s trying to pick a fight with them, but he’s smashing this individual to do so,” Lindenmuth said.

Lindenmuth said the car strike was accidental and happened as Morales reacted to avoid hitting a car that was in front of him.

In response to criticism of Morales’ actions and to the training of ICE officers, an ICE spokesperson said in an email that “allegations that ICE struck Miguel Parra-Hernandez intentionally are RECKLESS and FALSE.”

“The men and women of ICE are entrusted with upholding the rule of law and are held to the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and ethical conduct,” the ICE spokesperson stated.

Video of the collision captured by cameras from local businesses and bystanders recorded Morales pursuing Parra, who exits a stopped truck and begins running. Morales’ vehicle makes a quick left turn in front of a stopped vehicle and hits Parra.

Morales’ body camera video captures the officer saying, “You got hit with the car, bro,” turning Parra over, straightening his leg, trying to pick him up from under his arms and telling others he should be moved into the car.

Teare said Morales’ attempt to move Parra was “careless.”

“These are not things that a law enforcement officer would ever do to someone that they had detained, with or without force, if they were complaining of injury,” Teare said.

According to the DA’s office, Morales had two handcuffed arrestees sitting in the back of his car without seat belts when the vehicle hit Parra. To Teare, that was illustrative of the problems with the agency’s tactics and lack of proper training and vetting of ICE officers.

Morales is the first ICE agent indicted in Texas. In May, prosecutors in Minnesota charged ICE enforcement officer Christian Castro in connection with the January shooting of Julio Sosa-Celis, and he was indicted on federal charges in September for making false statements to investigators about the case.

Before joining ICE, Morales, originally from Brownsville, Texas, on the U.S.-Mexico border, worked several stints as a guard. One of those jobs was at the Port Isabel Detention Center, an ICE facility that has historically been the final stop before an immigrant is shuttled out of the country, Lindenmuth said.

Morales started young, working from August 2012 to January 2013 as a corrections officer for Cameron County in Olmito, Texas, Lindemuth said.

He then joined the military and worked as a military police officer, though was not deployed during his two years of Army service, Lindenmuth said. An Army spokesperson said Morales left in 2014 with the rank of private first class.

Morales then spent seven months with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice as a mid-level correctional officer overseeing the care and custody of inmates with limited supervision, according to Amanda Hernandez, a TDCJ spokeswoman.

He resigned in 2018 while on probation with the agency for falsification of records, specifically documenting security rounds as completed when they had not been conducted, Hernandez said in an email.

Lindenmuth said he did not immediately have further information about the probation.

On Friday, Teare said he was “not familiar with a single agency that would have hired” Morales, after seeing his work record.

Lindenmuth said his client is an ordained pastor of a Christian-based church. He said Morales studied to be a police chaplain at Universidad Cristiana Internacional El Shaddai in Dallas and has done missionary work in other countries.

“He is a faith-based person,” Lindenmuth said. “You know, he is a good person who tries to help people.”