00:00Good morning. My name is Jake Holmes. I'm the United States Attorney for the Eastern District
00:04of Texas. Eastern District of Texas, under the leadership of President Trump and Attorney General
00:09Bondi, is fully engaged with Operation Take Back America. That's a mission to stop illegal
00:18immigration, dismantle cartels, and to protect our communities from violent crime. Operation
00:26Take Back America is what it looks like to see law and order in action. As part of this
00:32mission to take back America, I'm here today to announce an indictment related to a violent
00:37vehicle ramming attack on our Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, or ICE. Before
00:45I get into the facts of that case, but let me state to you that vehicles in the hands of
00:53individuals who intends to obstruct or evade law enforcement are deadly weapons. When
01:00someone runs down an ICE officer or any federal law or local law enforcement officer, those
01:07deadly weapons act as battering rams. And it is a violent attack and it will not be tolerated.
01:17Fleeing from the police or obstructing their enforcement isn't acceptable and we will not
01:22stand for it. Now to the facts of this indictment. Today, I announced the indictment of Herson
01:30Lopez Sanchez, a 28-year-old citizen of Honduras. The United States Grand Jury in Sherman, Texas,
01:38has charged him with three counts of assaulting federal immigration agents in the Eastern District
01:43of Texas. The indictment alleges that on December 1st, 2025, federal immigration agents attempted
01:51to conduct a lawful stop on the vehicle that was owned by Lopez Sanchez. As stated before,
01:58Lopez Sanchez is a Honduran national and he was illegally present in the United States. He initially
02:06brought his vehicle to a stop. The vehicle stop was conducted on South Stemmons freeway. It was at 8.04
02:13a.m. in the morning on a Monday morning, December 1st, 2025. It was right at the height of rush hour. He
02:21brought his vehicle to a stop and the federal agents were driving three separate vehicles. Each one of those
02:28vehicles had red and blue flashing lights clearly identified as law enforcement. After the the agents,
02:38incidentally, were also wearing their vests with law enforcement insignia on them. They were clearly
02:44identified as law enforcement. An agent, the indictment alleges that soon after he was pulled over,
02:55Lopez Sanchez suddenly placed his vehicle in reverse and rammed the federal agents in the vehicle behind
03:03him while one agent had his leg hanging outside the vehicle just as he was getting ready to get out of
03:09the vehicle. He had to jump out of the way and he was able to jump out of the way. But this maneuver
03:15caused enough space for Lopez Sanchez to drive around the other law enforcement vehicles and attempt to
03:21flee. Federal agents began a pursuit of Lopez Sanchez with the red and blue flashing lights engaged.
03:28They also engaged a siren. They were also using their PA system to tell him to stop both in Spanish
03:34and in English. He didn't stop. An agent driving one of his one of the law enforcement vehicles was
03:42able to position his vehicle between Lopez Sanchez and his escape route. Instead of stopping, Lopez
03:49Sanchez accelerated. He accelerated into crossing into the wrong lane of traffic in front of him.
03:56He was coming into ongoing traffic and he rammed the vehicle injuring the two agents inside.
04:02That's the vehicle that's behind me here today.
04:07The ramming was so violent that it deployed all the airbags in the vehicle. 9-1-1 was called to assist
04:14the passenger in that vehicle an ICE agent. Lopez Sanchez continued to evade with the third vehicle
04:21pursuing behind him on the East Valley Ridge Boulevard in Louisville for about 10 minutes before he stopped
04:27the vehicle on a median and all five occupants in that vehicle including himself fled on foot. Three of the
04:36occupants were ultimately detained with the help of some of the civilians in the area. Lopez Sanchez
04:44was identified as the owner and the driver of the vehicle and he remains at large today. I want to take
04:49this opportunity to thank the brave men and women of law enforcement. They're standing behind me and
04:57their representatives from ICE and the FBI. Not with us today is Louisville Police Department but they were
05:04instrumental in this investigation as well in assisting the event as it occurred. These agencies work this
05:16case as a team and they're working to keep us safe every single day. For the men and women in law
05:24enforcement this isn't just a job. These are their homes. They want to do what everybody wants to do. They
05:34want to live in their communities safely. They work to protect their communities and themselves from
05:40safety, from danger. They swear an oath, each one of them, to enforce the Constitution and the laws of
05:48the United States and that's exactly what they're doing today and what they were doing on that day.
05:54I'll now turn it over to FBI Special Agent in Charge, Assistant Special Agent in Charge, Jeremy Wright.
05:59We'll talk about Lopez Sanchez's status as a fugitive.
06:06Thank you, Jack. Good morning. My name is Jeremy Wright. I'm an Assistant Special Agent in Charge for FBI
06:12Dallas. This is just the latest example of the increasing dangers that law enforcement faces on a
06:18daily basis. As U.S. Attorney Combs mentioned, after striking an ICE vehicle that was occupied by an ICE
06:25agent, Lopez Sanchez fled the scene in his truck. Following a pursuit, he struck another ICE vehicle
06:33where two agents were injured. He then fled on foot and remains at large today. The FBI will continue to
06:40stand with and work alongside our federal partners and local partners to ensure that anyone who harms
06:47attempts or attempts to harm law enforcement will be held accountable. This is an active fugitive
06:55investigation where we are committed to finding and bringing Lopez Sanchez into custody so that he may
07:01face justice. Today, I'm here to announce that the FBI is offering a reward of up to $15,000 for
07:09information leading to the arrest and conviction of Ersan Lopez Sanchez. He's described as a Hispanic male from
07:17Honduras, standing five feet, eight inches tall, weighing 165 pounds. He has black hair and brown eyes. He's
07:2528 years old and works as a roofer. We're asking anyone with information to call 1-800-CALL-FBI or submit a tip
07:35at tips.fbi.gov. I'll turn it back over to you. When an illegal alien who should have never been in
07:45our country to begin with violently assaults our law enforcement in Texas, he'll be met with the full
07:52force of this Justice Department. What are your questions?
07:55Thank you for your question. Well, it's a very, it's still an active investigation. Obviously,
08:06Mr. Lopez Sanchez is a fugitive. And so I think we're going to stay away from that right now.
08:15He did not have a criminal background or active warrants that are known to us.
08:19Why don't this information now? It happened almost two months ago. Is this obviously a part of what's
08:24happening in Minneapolis? And also, the administration could really emphasize those assaults on
08:30officers. Why now? Well, there clearly are assaults on officers. This is an example. And it is
08:37happening. But the investigation into Lopez Sanchez has been ongoing. The search for Lopez Sanchez
08:44has been ongoing. And he's not been located yet. And we determined that now was the time to go public
08:52with this information in the effort to try and further this investigation.
09:03I think I'm going to turn that one over to acting field office director Robert Serna.
09:14Good morning. My name is Robert Serna. I'm the acting field office director for ICRO
09:19in Dallas. As far as that question, the officers did sustain some injuries, but I
09:25won't go into details into the severity of those those injuries.
09:34Yes, there were actually officers from Dallas ERO, but from our Oklahoma City office.
09:44Yes, there was a written process and the position in Massachusetts at first school
09:49just as well as we heard the states that are currently rising.
09:51Everybody was serving for the state of Chicago and our Oklahoma City office.
09:54And when you came up with the choice for the state of Chicago?
09:56What?
09:57I don't know, for these days, just as Vert the State of California,
09:59would you move to the state of Chicago and the state of Chicago and the state of Chicago,
10:02are the state of Chicago?
10:04And the state of Chicago is doing that thing and they have to be focused?
10:06How do you move to the state of Chicago?
10:07Do you wait to the state of Chicago point the state of Chicago and the state of Chicago?
10:08I'm not going to be doing this today.
10:10Well, you know, we're here to announce this indictment today, so I'm not going to speak to what's happening elsewhere aside from this indictment.
10:19But what I would tell you is certainly people have a First Amendment right to protest, to seek redress of their grievances.
10:29That's in the First Amendment.
10:30What's in the Constitution also, though, is in Article I of the Constitution, it gives Congress the right to enact laws regarding our immigration.
10:45And Article II of the Constitution gives the executive the duty to faithfully execute those laws.
10:53And that's exactly what these individuals are doing.
10:56And protesting is not interfering with law enforcement.
11:01Interfering with law enforcement is a crime, and it will be treated as a crime, because that is not a protest.
11:07So that's what I would say about that.
11:23Again, it's an act of investigation.
11:25And I don't have anything to offer right now on what's happening with the other three.
11:30Thank you, Ben.
11:30Are you investigating others?
11:37Yeah, the question was, are we investigating others?
11:43I can tell you this.
11:44We're seeing across the board a significant increase in assaults on federal officers, which is concerning.
11:53There's been a number of other vehicle-related, we call them AFOs, assaults on federal officers, that we are investigating.
11:59We've kind of taken the approach here in North Texas across the judicial districts that the FBI will take the lead on all of those investigations to have consistency in how we're doing it.
12:10So it is concerning, the increase that we see, and just to piggyback on what Jay said, I think the concerning thing is if we normalize, if we make it okay for people to not adhere to the commands of law enforcement, I think it creates a danger.
12:27Not just for our law enforcement officers, which we are concerned about, it creates a danger to everyone in the area, including potential innocent people.
12:34So we are taking this very seriously.
12:36We are announcing this today to ask for help to locate Lopez Sanchez, but also maybe as a public service announcement to just, you know, really think through these situations because we don't want any of these, we don't want this to occur.
12:50We don't want anyone to be heard, but we will take it very seriously and hold it accountable.
12:53There are a number of other investigations around somewhere.
12:59Yes.
13:01Yeah, obviously we work really well here in North Texas.
13:04Many of you are very familiar to me, and I think we've had this conversation.
13:07We have great partnerships across the board with both U.S. districts, state, local, federal partners.
13:14The FBI has a lead on the fugitive investigation.
13:16I know Louisville PD was an integral part in this.
13:18I think you know that the FBI, we're going to leverage all resources available to be able to locate him.
13:26We have no reason to believe he's fled.
13:28We believe he's still in the area, and we believe people know where he's at.
13:31So that's what we're going to do first and foremost, and then we'll employ all the resources that we have to find a look at, which we will.
13:37We will find and locate Irsan Lopez Sanchez.
13:42Thank you all.
