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The Department of Justice (DoJ) has opened a civil-rights case into the shooting of activist Alex Pretty in Minneapolis last weekend by Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) agents.
In a statement on Friday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the case is being examined by the FBI, who may be assisted by the DoJ’s Civil Rights Division.
Pretti, a 37-year-old former nurse, was shot and killed during a confrontation with federal agents while they were trying to arrest an illegal immigrant with a criminal record. Pretti was armed with a pistol.
“The officers attempted to disarm the suspect but the armed suspect violently resisted,” the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wrote in a statement on last Saturday.
Both federal agents who shot Pretti have been put on administrative leave, which is standard protocol after such an incident.
Subsequently released video footage showed that the confrontation that led to his death was not the first time Pretti had been involved in a violent clash with federal agents in Minneapolis.
A video recorded on 13 January was shared by President Trump and showed Pretti spitting at federal agents, taunting them and kicking in the taillights of one of their vehicles.
Pretti was subsequently tackled by federal agents.
He is the second person to be killed by immigration agents during enforcement operations in Minneapolis. At the beginning of January, Renee Good was shot while attempting to ram an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer in her SUV.
President Trump’s surge, which has seen 3,000 federal agents arrive in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota, has been met with angry, determined resistance. Protests have been highly coordinated, and there have been suggestions of official collusion, including orders for local law enforcement to stand down.
Since Pretti’s shooting last weekend, the White House appears to have reached a deal with state and city government in Minnesota provide local support for immigration enforcement.
The new collaboration is expected to lead to a reduction in the number of federal agents in the Twin Cities area.
