Feds expand terrorism charges in July shooting at Texas immigration detention center

The Prairieland Detention Center is seen, Sept. 15, 2016, in Alvarado, Texas. (Louis DeLuca/The Dallas Morning News via AP, File)

DALLAS — Federal prosecutors in Texas have charged six more people with a new terrorism-related charge in the July shooting outside an immigration detention center near Dallas, and said six others are scheduled to enter guilty pleas in the case.

The latest indictment in the case, issued Friday, expands on previous charges and relies on President Trump’s recent declaration that deems the decentralized movement known as antifa a domestic terrorist organization. Trump blames antifa for political violence.

The case stems from the July 4 shooting outside the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, southwest of Dallas, that injured a police officer. The charges also include rioting, attempted murder and weapons and explosives charges.

Prosecutors said the group threw fireworks at the facility, vandalized vehicles and then shot at responding police and correctional officers, striking an Alvarado officer in the neck. He was later released from a hospital.

The shooting took place as U.S. President Trump’ s administration ramped up deportations.

Patrick McClain, a lawyer for defendant Zachary Evetts, said he has seen no evidence to support the government’s view of the case. He said his client would again plead not guilty at the Dec. 3 arraignment on the new charges.

“Mr. Evetts has never been a member of anything like a ‘North Texas Antifa Cell,’ and from the evidence provided to us by the government so far, there is no evidence that such an organization ever existed,” McClain said Saturday.

Short for “anti-fascists,” antifa is not a single organization but rather an umbrella term for far-left-leaning militant groups that confront or resist neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations.