PROVIDENCE – A previously deported Guatemalan national, charged with driving under the influence last month, allegedly assaulted and fled from a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer when he was found driving again. He was ordered detained by a federal judge after he was arrested in Providence on Thursday.
Miguel Tamup-Tamup, 28, was ordered held during an initial appearance before a US Magistrate Judge after he was taken into custody at a residence in the city on Thursday, according to the Rhode Island US Attorney’s Office.
Tamup-Tamup, who was illegally in the United States at the time of his arrest, faces a charge of assault, resisting, and impeding a law enforcement officer in the performance of official duties, prosecutors said.
Officials allege Tamup-Tamup “struggled with an ICE deportation officer and Homeland Security Investigations agents as they attempted to apprehend him as authorized by a Warrant for Arrest of Alien.”
“A Homeland Security Investigations agent suffered serious injury during the encounter,” prosecutors said.
Tamup-Tamup was first arrested on April 19 and charged with driving under the influence, after his car hit another vehicle, according to prosecutors, who said his “fingerprints matched ICE fingerprint records associated with a person flagged as being in the United States illegally.”
He was arraigned and released, officials said.
Then on April 30, ICE deportation officers and Homeland Security Investigations agents stopped a vehicle Tamup-Tamup was driving in Providence, prosecutors said.
“After he refused to exit, the law enforcement agents guided him out of the vehicle,” officials said. “While the agents attempted to place [Tamup-Tamup] in handcuffs, he resisted, threw his upper body and shoulders against the agents, flailed his arms, and broke an agent’s hold. During the encounter, one of the agents fell to the ground and suffered a serious leg injury.”
Tamup-Tamup fled the scene as agents attended to their injured colleague, prosecutors said. The agent’s condition was unknown on Friday.
On Thursday, he was located at a Providence residence and arrested, officials said.
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