A man who was out protesting against ICE raids in downtown Los Angeles this week spoke with KTLA after an officer’s close-range shot to his groin with a rubber bullet severely bruised one of his testicles… and “shattered” the other.
“It sucks to sit down,” the 33-year-old demonstrator, Martin Santoyo, said to start off the interview.
Santoyo, who is now home from the hospital but still in recovery and can’t walk, said the incident happened on Monday in the area of Temple Street, just after he got off his bicycle within the crowd of protesters and law enforcement. He noted that before this happened, he did not hear any officers declaring an “unlawful gathering.”
He told KTLA that he was grabbing a water bottle from his backpack when authorities started pushing forward toward the group.
“Then they start shouting, ‘Move back!’ But I’m still fixing up my backpack and my bike, and then they just pushed me,” recounted Santoyo. “On instinct, I tell a cop, ‘Don’t push me, I’m already moving back.’ And then the cop right next to him had a gun and just aimed and shot.”
Santoyo said he would estimate that the officer who shot him was standing about two to three feet away from him, and shot him in the groin.
“After I got hit, I couldn’t really walk– I was too much in shock, and then they’re still pushing me,” said Santoyo. “Some other protesters were trying to help me walk, but they’re pushing them too, and everyone’s shouting, ‘Yo, he just got hit, let him breathe.’ I needed to sit down for a bit, but they kept pushing.”
Bystanders eventually helped Santoyo get medical attention, and he was ultimately taken to the hospital, where he had to undergo surgery for the injuries he sustained.
“I have a bruised left testicle and my right testicle was shattered,” Santoyo explained. “They say that they somewhat fixed it, so it should have some function, but it’s still very badly damaged.”
Doctors did not have a time estimate for his recovery, but they told Santoyo to return in about five to eight days to be seen again, and then they will assess how he’s doing and when he can return to work.
As for the protests he participated in before his injury, Santoyo said he went to have his voice heard and speak out for others.
“I went for the people that can’t, the people who are too scared to go. There are a lot of kids that I know who’ve lost their parents,” he said.
However, despite his injuries, Santoyo said he planned to return to the protests on Saturday, whether he would be walking or not. “The 14th is a big movement, so I might be there on a wheelchair,” he said.