ICE agent appears in federal court for Minneapolis shooting

CASTRO INSIDE THE FEDERAL COURTHOUSE IN ST. PAUL TODAY AFTER APPEARING IN STATE COURT YESTERDAY. BILL KELLER JOINS US TO TALK MORE ABOUT WHAT WE KNOW AND WHAT'S AHEAD FOR THIS CASE. IT'S CERTAINLY A LOT OF ATTENTION ON THIS ONE. Yeah, in fact, this has really been a revolving door in and out of jail for Christian Castro. He was in a Texas jail for three months, 90 days after he was charged in Hennepin County, but of course you recall the expedition fight. They wouldn't release him to us. Then he gets charged federally. He gets released from that. He gets charged federally. He bonds out a $75,000 bail. Then yesterday or earlier this week, he drives up from Texas, gets arrested by the DCA trying to coordinate turning himself in. Yeah. Spent the night in jail. Had an appearance on those state charges yesterday. Bonded out again on a $200,000 bail. And this morning, we got to see him not in an orange jumpsuit, in a pretty nice suit, to be honest with you. Looked pretty good walking into court this morning. Big media presence. Everyone wanted to see him. It did not take long. It was about 20 minutes for the judge to kind of do a little bit of housekeeping. Now, just to recap, he is charged with six counts of providing false information to federal investigators. He's an ICE agent who shot that Venezuelan man in the leg. He recovered. But the problem was he lied about what led up to that shooting, said that he was being attacked with a shovel and a broom handle. Video surveillance showed that not to be true. Ultimately, despite the wishes of some in the White House, he was charged federally. That kind of changed the dynamics about his extradition. So, anyways, he was in here today. Kind of the big headline was that he was released with no bond. Basically, they're letting him stay. He already posted for that Texas appearance. So the U.S. government said they're not seeking detainment. So he is a free man. We watched him walk out of court just about 20 minutes later. But he's got some conditions. He had to surrender his passport. That was already done. He was considered a flight risk. There was concern because of his connections with Mexico and people he knew there that he might be a flight risk. But he still bonded out. He had to sign a waiver of extradition. So that's not going to be an issue for anything. He's going to show up for court. He'll have some electronic monitoring. He's under a curfew. He's got to go find a job. Can't do it as an ICE agent. Had to give up his weapon and all that. But also what's interesting is the judge designated this as a complex case. And what that essentially does is it hits the pause button. Rules say that for a speedy trial, somebody has to have 70 days between the indictment and going to trial. This hits the pause button, basically saying, hey, they need more time for discovery. There's going to be a lot of pretrial motions. A lot of evidence. I mean, you think about all the things that were going on in Metro Surge. They could scrutinize every enforcement action he was ever involved in. But he walked out of the federal courthouse. He'll be back in state court here, I believe, in November. The attorneys have got a couple of weeks to file their first round of motions. And this is going to be a very closely watched, very complex case. Yeah, interesting. And certainly could be lengthy, too, I can imagine. So where does he go now? Does he go back to Texas? He's only allowed to be either in Texas or in Minnesota. Now, that tells me you can't really drive from one to the other. Right. So he is a Texas resident. And so I imagine he could fly back to Texas. And as long as he comes back here for his appearances, that gets expensive as well. So I don't know. He'll be allowed to stay here. But this judge specifically said, you can't go to Mexico. Makes sense. Yeah. OK, so that was today's federal court. And so now we know he's out of court until November. That's when we go back for state and federal. And they can certainly have other dates pop up a little bit. But what's interesting is that they are actually advancing both the federal case and the state case at the same time. Hennepin County Attorney Miriam Moriarty said in a press conference yesterday that she would not be surprised if they tried to vacate, have a motion to vacate the state trial. But right now, they're both moving forward at the same time. Wow. That's going to get expensive, too. That is. And honestly, a little bit confusing. So thank you for breaking everything down between state and federal again. Bill Keller, appreciate your time. Thank you so much.