Fatal ICE shooting in Minneapolis reflects pattern of armed confrontations nationwide

It was the kind of standoff that has become routine since the Trump administration launched its immigration crackdown in June: Unmarked federal vehicles, sirens blaring, move toward a maroon SUV parked diagonally in the middle of a residential road in Minneapolis. Bystander video shows the driver waving as one of the vehicles passes and two immigration officers approach his car on foot.

“Get out of the car,” one of them shouts and pulls the door handle. In the video, the driver is seen backing up to right the car, then turning right and moving forward, as a third agent in the front left corner of the vehicle draws his gun and fires three times at point-blank range.

The car spun forward and hit a car on the street. Driver Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, died.

Wednesday’s shooting was the latest in a series of shootouts across the country in which agents have opened fire on drivers they claim are using their vehicles as weapons.

“This does not surprise me and until things change this dramatically, and I say this unfortunately, it will not be the last tragic incident involving ICE and protesters,” said Jim Bueermann, founder and president of the Institute for Future Policing.

Bueermann said the increase in immigration enforcement operations across the country, combined with a lack of uniform training for agents and a disconnect between federal operations and local coordination, means more shootings are likely.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the officer opened fire in Minneapolis because he feared for his life during “an act of domestic terrorism.” He said Good “weaponized his car and tried to run over a law enforcement officer.”

But the video shows the agent was not in the path of the vehicle when he fired, sparking outrage across the country, including in California where protesters were present. took to the streets Wednesday night. State lawmakers acted quickly I condemn the attack Assemblyman Mark González (D-Los Angeles) called it a “public execution.”

Cynthia Santiago, a Los Angeles-based lawyer who represented a man shot by immigration agents in Ontario, said the tactics in Minnesota mirror those used by agents in Southern California.

“It’s happened there, but in our different communities in Southern California, I look at videos of people being stopped all the time, windows being broken, and being pulled out of their cars,” Santiago said.

When an immigration officer shot Carlitos Ricardo Parias in Los Angeles in late October, the Department of Homeland Security alleged that the popular TikTok streamer “gunned” his car and crashed into an agent’s vehicle to evade arrest.

Body camera footage that emerged months later showed Parias throwing his hands in the air and repeatedly asking why he was being stopped. His car is pinned down by federal vehicles and he doesn’t move before the agent shoots him. Federal prosecutors dismissed the charges against Parias shortly after the video was released.

His lawyers said in November, a little more than a week after Parias was shot, food bank worker Carlos Jimenez approached agents conducting a sting operation at a bus stop in Ontario and warned them that school children would soon be there.

“He was saying to them: ‘Excuse me. Can you please finish this?’ And the masked agent immediately pulls out his gun and speaks a few words,” Santiago said. “[The agent is] He also uses pepper spray.”

“He’s scared and he’s trying to get out of this situation,” he said. His car was partially blocked by the agents’ vehicles.

“He had to turn back to escape,” said attorney Robert Simon.

An agent shot him in the back of the shoulder through the rear passenger window.

No video of the attack has emerged.

Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said at the time that Jimenez was “attempting to overwhelm the officers by turning directly back at them without stopping” and that the shots were “defensive.”

Jimenez, 25, pleaded not guilty to assaulting a federal officer in November and was released on bail.

Marimar Martinez, 30, faced similar allegations in Chicago after an immigration officer shot her five times during a traffic fight in August. Homeland Security said he “ambushed” the agents by ramming their vehicle. The US attorney dropped the charges in November.

“The same thing will continue to happen as we continue to deploy these agents who are trained to work at the border to enforce immigration laws, drop them off in the U.S. cities they come from, and put them in situations they’re not ready for,” said Martinez’s attorney, Christopher Parente.

He became an undocumented immigrant shot and killed Shot at close range by an immigration officer in Chicago in September. The Trump administration said Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez drove his vehicle into the agents, dragging one of them and causing serious injuries. But in the body camera video, the manager said the injuries were “nothing major.”

In San Bernardino, Francisco Longoria was driving his truck when a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer shot at him in August. Homeland Security officials said officers were injured during the encounter in which Longoria tried to “run them over.”

Longoria’s lawyers said he feared for his safety and tried to flee after masked officers broke his car window.

(In a separate confrontation, an off-duty immigration officer shot and killed father of two Keith Porter at a Northridge apartment complex on New Year’s Eve. Homeland Security said the agent was responding to an active shooter. Porter’s family said he fired a gun into the air.)

Marimar Martinez, who was shot by immigration officers, is surrounded by her family after being released from a federal prison in Chicago on October 6.

(E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune via Associated Press)

The shooting in Minneapolis occurred a day after Homeland Security began what ICE director Todd Lyons called its “largest operation ever” in Minnesota, where the Trump administration has deployed more than 2,000 agents.

Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said immigration officers were conducting operations Wednesday morning when they were hindered by protesters. Different explanations quickly emerged in the hours after Good’s death.

McLaughlin claimed Good committed an act of domestic terrorism, stating that he “armed his vehicle” and attempted to kill the officers.

Federal agents are stepping back as protesters gather at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Minneapolis.

(Mustafa Bassim / Anadolu via Getty Images)

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey rejected claims that the federal agent acted in self-defense and called for ICE to leave the city.

“People are being hurt. Families are being torn apart,” Frey said at a news conference Wednesday. “Longtime residents of Minneapolis, who have contributed greatly to our city, our culture, our economy, are being terrorized and now someone is dead. That’s your responsibility, and it’s your responsibility to leave.”

Protesters clashed with law enforcement outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minneapolis.

(Mustafa Bassim / Anadolu via Getty Images)

Bueermann said a clear picture of what happened probably won’t be available until investigations are completed.

“Everyone wants to know the answer right now, and it’s not possible,” he said. “All this confusion is that both explanations are right and wrong at the same time… it will take a while for someone to determine that.”

Parente said his client, Martinez, who survived five shootings and was exonerated, was horrified but not surprised after Wednesday’s shooting.

“It’s very sad for him to see this, but thankfully he’s alive to see it,” Parente said. “Unfortunately, you will see that the number of bullets that these agents fire at us, at the citizens and at the people living in these cities, will increase day by day.”