CHARLOTTE, N.C. — After federal immigration officers in Charlotte saw a man taking photos of them, they chased him nearly two miles down a main road and made plans to “smash” into him, video played in court Thursday showed.

Then they broke his window, charged him with a federal felony and accused him of assaulting them.

Miguel Angel Garcia Martinez — a U.S. citizen and father of two young children — was “trying to protect immigrants,” his family said, as Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents patrolled Charlotte and made more than 300 arrests this week.

He did this by taking photos and sending them in an Instagram chat, where they were posted for the public to see. When agents spotted Martinez snapping pictures at multiple locations on Sunday, Nov. 16, they told him to leave, got out of their cars and tugged on his door handle.

Martinez was doing “citizen journalism,” and officers had no right to stop him, his lawyer argued Thursday in court.

Even still, Martinez left, officers chased and Martinez ended up in jail, his lawyer said. He was charged Monday with assaulting, resisting and impeding federal officers, a felony. If prosecuted at the highest level, the charge could carry a 20-year prison sentence.

Now, after a three-hour Thursday hearing held days after Martinez’s arrest, a federal judge is considering whether agents had probable cause to arrest and charge him in the first place.

Documenting Border Patrol

Martinez, 24, first saw agents at a Home Depot off University City Boulevard, his brother told The Charlotte Observer.

Agents later saw him at a U.S. Postal Service office in northwest Charlotte, at 6700 N. Tryon St., according to court documents. As Martinez took photos, one agent made “a gesture with his hands,” documents say, apparently trying to tell Martinez to go away.

Martinez sent more photos and drove away — toward his parents’ home, he told investigators.

On his way, he passed more agents outside a bowling alley on North Tryon Street and stopped for more photos. When he turned out of that lot, he found another convoy of agents outside the Pull-A-Part auto parts store, according to court documents.

There, agents said he was “circling” them, they told investigators. At one point he was eight to 10 feet away, they said.

Martinez told investigators he was driving around the parking lot looking for a parking spot far away from them.

In that lot, two Border Patrol officers got out of their cars, asking Martinez to get out of his car for a “voluntary stop,” according to court documents.

He didn’t get out, and agents “grabbed the handle of Martinez’s van and attempted to open the door,” according to court documents. Martinez drove away while “the Border Patrol Officer pounded” the car, court documents say.

The officers followed and radioed their plans to do a traffic stop.

A car carrying four ICE agents heard that call and came to the intersection. One started recording.

ICE agent’s cellphone video

“This is great,” an unnamed officer said as they started following Martinez, as captured by an ICE agent’s cellphone video played in court Thursday.

“This is fun,” another replied.

The video was less than five minutes long and showed officers chasing Martinez about two miles down North Tryon Street before boxing him in.

“He’s gonna crash,” an officer said.

One replied: “He’s gonna get shot is what’s gonna happen.”

“I’m gonna smash my car,” the driver said.

About 30 seconds later, he did.

Agents several times tried to box Martinez in, forcing him to swerve onto medians and around agents’ cars and other cars to avoid collisions, his federal public defender, J.P. Davis, argued in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina.

“He’s going to kill someone,” one agent said as Martinez briefly drove against traffic. At least one federal vehicle drove into oncoming traffic before Martinez did, video shows.

Video shows Martinez merged right into a lane to avoid hitting another person driving, and the ICE driver veered left — toward Martinez.

The cars briefly collided and continued driving.

“I tried, I tried my best,” the officer driving said. “Sorry, boys.”

As Martinez continued to drive away, one officer said “this is now a federal felony” as others in the car yelled: “Hit him guys, why are you afraid of him? Knock him out! Hit him!”

As other officers in SUVs tried to box Martinez in, the driving agent on video said: “I don’t want to do it anymore.” Officers eventually stopped Martinez, and when they got out of their cars, they yelled: “Watch for crossfire!”

Officers broke his driver side window to get him out of his van and later reported that “an officer was injured” and claimed Martinez rammed into them.

Martinez told officers he had a loaded gun and multiple magazines in between his front seats. Officers later found that he also had a license plate that wasn’t registered to his car or name. Martinez said he used that license plate so he wouldn’t have to pay parking tickets outside his work near the AvidXchange Music Factory concert venues and clubs — where parking can cost upward of $20 any weekend.

After detaining Martinez, federal agents put him into their car and took him to the hospital.

In court, Davis asked Charlotte FBI Special Agent Felix Manuel Del Toro, who interviewed Martinez, if he remembered Martinez saying there was a 12-pack of Modelo Negra in the agents’ car.

“I don’t know if he said ‘Negra,” Del Toro said. “There were Modelos.”

‘An out of control agency’

During a cross examination, Del Toro told Davis that, according to reports, Martinez only drove recklessly after officers started chasing him. He was fleeing an unlawful traffic stop, Davis said — which citizens are allowed to do.

Davis said Martinez was practicing “citizen journalism” when he observed and documented Border Patrol agents in public spaces around Charlotte. For nearly a week, masked federal police in paramilitary gear confronted people in public spaces and threatened some U.S. citizens in the process.

“Customs and Border Patrol was attacking a U.S. citizen for exercising a cardinal First Amendment right,” Davis said in court.

He also said Border Patrol is an “out-of-control agency” that abuses the law and harms U.S. citizens. Gregory Bovino — who led the Charlotte operation — has lied under oath, and agents have lied about use of force, Davis said, referencing court cases in areas agents previously targeted, such as Chicago and Portland.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Caryn Finley argued Martinez did assault, resist, oppose, impede, intimidate and interfere with officers by fleeing and driving recklessly. She said his car was a deadly weapon he used to carry out each of those six offenses.

“It’s lucky nobody got hurt,” she told the judge, saying Martinez could have “just stopped” instead of putting officers and people in danger.

Davis argued agents attacked Martinez with their deadly weapons: their cars.

“No one would have been in danger if Custom and Border Protection didn’t infringe on citizens’ rights,” Davis said.

No signs inside court

More than two dozen protesters stood outside Charlotte’s federal courthouse Thursday before Martinez’s hearing. Among them was a mother with her children — 8, 11 and 13 — holding signs that said: “Families belong together.” Joshua Long, another man arrested and charged with assaulting officers in Charlotte after he documented their locations, was also there.

Long told the Observer officers “pulled me from my car after they pointed a gun at me, and arrested me on the ground” without reading him his rights or telling him why he was being arrested.

Long and about a dozen other community members made it inside court — but without their protest signs.

Martinez’s brother, 18-year-old Brayan Vicente Martinez, organized the protest with his 19-year-old girlfriend, Lienarani Bermudez.

The Martinez brothers are both U.S. citizens; their parents immigrated from Mexico. Brayan Martinez said he and his brother felt like they “were the only ones who could go out and do anything to help.”

“It’s already been so scary lately with all these people getting detained by ICE,” Bermudez said. “(Miguel) had it in him to try and locate (agents) and send it to an Instagram account to make sure people don’t go to those areas.”

The young couple and Miguel Martinez’s own family endured days unsure of where Miguel was.

After he was arrested, Bermudez and Brayan Martinez briefly saw Miguel Martinez through a tinted SUV window at the hospital before officers drove off. Updates were sparse, cries were constant and sleep was rare.

Miguel Martinez would call his girlfriend with updates from jail when he could. Normally, he’d tell her which jail he was in this time and ask about their two children — a 3-year-old daughter and 1-year-old son.

For days, anytime anyone called, the young girl yells: “Hi Daddy!”

It’s not daddy, her mother would reply — until Thursday.

U.S. Magistrate Judge David Keesler released Miguel Martinez on a $25,000 unsecured bond Thursday, and he was released from the Caldwell County Jail on Thursday evening.

Keesler had not issued a ruling on whether officers had probable cause to charge Miguel Martinez as of Friday morning.

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