The migrant accused of homicide for the natural death of the police officer who detained him in Florida

Virgilio Aguilar Méndez, an 18-year-old undocumented migrant of Guatemalan origin, has been detained since last May in a prison in Florida, United States, after the death of the police officer who arrested him. He faces charges of aggravated manslaughter and could receive a harsh sentence.

However, Aguilar did not kill the police officer identified as Michael Paul Kunovich, 52 years old. St. Johns County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Floridadied of natural causes due to a cardiac arrhythmia.

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This is how the events occurred. On May 19, the police Kunovich intervened to Aguilar in the parking lot of the Super 8 on State Road, “due to what he believed to be suspicious behavior,” according to the police arrest report.

The body camera video of Kunovich showed that when Aguilar He saw the agent’s patrol car approaching and began to walk away from the scene.

The police officer got out of his patrol car and asked for his identification. The young man responded that he did not speak English.

The migrant, who worked in the field, apologized to the officer and pointed out the hotel where he was staying.

Then, Kunovich tried to search Aguilar to check if he had weapons, but he walked away and tried to flee. He kept repeating that he didn’t speak English.

Then, more agents arrived and Aguilar He continued to resist. Once on the ground, the police applied several electric shocks to him. In total, according to the official report, they shot him several times with the pistol. Taser in 2 minutes.

“While fighting on the ground with Sgt. Kunovich and other officers, the defendant grabbed Sergeant Kunovich’s Taser in an attempt to gain control of the weapon,” a police document states.

“After taking control and handcuffing the defendant, he armed himself with a folding knife, which he removed from the pockets of his shorts. “The officers gave loud verbal commands to drop the knife, which were ignored and the knife had to be forcefully removed from the defendant’s hands,” the report continues.

The moment the police take the knife from him, Aguilar He shouts that he uses the knife to cut “watermelons”. In his subsequent statements he explained that it was to cut fruit and sell it.

The entire struggle lasted more than 6 minutes.

Subsequently, Aguilar He told agents that he resisted arrest “out of fear of being deported.”

He also admitted that he understood the verbal commands he was given, but decided not to obey them in an attempt to escape, according to the police report.

After they handcuffed Aguilarthe police Kunovich He collapsed at the scene and was taken to the hospital, where he died. An autopsy determined that he died due to a cardiac arrhythmia.

Aguilar was accused by a prosecutor for aggravated manslaughter of an officer and resisting arrest with violence. He remains behind bars without bail.

In a bail motion, his former public defender wrote that the teenager lived in a room at the Super 8 with other immigrants and that when the police officer intervened, he was on the phone with his mother.

The migrant’s new attorney, Philip Arroyo, told Action Jax in December that he believes his client’s civil rights were violated and called the situation a “grave injustice.”

While St. Johns County Sheriff Robert Hardwick defended the actions of his officers and stated that Aguilar’s refusal to comply with what he was ordered Kunovich caused the tragedy.

For its part, the League of United Latin American Citizens (Lulac)the largest and oldest Latino group in the United States, last week criticized the judicial process against Aguilar.

In a statement cited by the EFE agency, Lulac described the accusation as “premature and unfair” considering the circumstances surrounding the altercation.

“We should not blame this death on this young man who was the target of excessive force by the police and group tactics by other agents who arrived at the scene,” Domingo García, president of Lulac, warned in the statement.

He described as “disgusting” the procedure carried out by the three police officers against Aguilar Mendezwhen there was no credible suspicion that he had committed any crime.

A judge scheduled a hearing for January to consider bail or drop charges against the teen.

Eliseo Santana, director of Lulac Florida, attacked Florida’s new anti-immigrant law SB-1718 and said that the measure, applied since last July, “has empowered many to see all Hispanics as criminals and undesirables.”

The activist said the charges against Aguilar should be thoroughly “reexamined” and dropped.

The migrant also faces a detention order from immigration authorities for being undocumented. Aguilar entered the United States when he was 17 years old.