A Guatemalan citizen residing illegally in the United States has been federally charged with assaulting a federal officer after allegedly striking a Deputy U.S. Marshal with his pickup truck while fleeing a traffic stop in Dallas, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Ryan Raybould announced on March 26.
The case involves Senel Galiano Sagastume, age 43, who was charged by federal complaint on March 24. According to the complaint, law enforcement officers initiated a traffic stop and instructed Sagastume to pull over. When Sagastume and his passengers refused to roll down their windows, officers breached the vehicle’s windows. Sagastume then allegedly accelerated his Chevrolet Silverado toward a uniformed Deputy U.S. Marshal, pinning him between the truck and another law enforcement vehicle and causing bodily injury.
Photographs included in the complaint reportedly show visible damage to the Marshal’s uniform as evidence of the incident. After fleeing the scene, Sagastume went to an apartment complex in Richardson, Texas, where he entered an apartment and was arrested following an hours-long standoff.
If convicted of forcibly assaulting a federal officer resulting in bodily injury, Sagastume faces up to 20 years in federal prison. He appeared before a United States Magistrate Judge in Dallas on March 25 for an initial hearing and remains in federal custody pending further proceedings.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Dallas Field Office and the United States Marshals Service are conducting the investigation. The prosecution is being handled by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas.
Authorities emphasized that “a complaint is merely an allegation of criminal conduct, not evidence,” adding that “all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.”
