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Minnesota officials accuse the FBI of blocking them from the ICE shooting investigation
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Minnesota officials accuse the FBI of blocking them from the ICE shooting investigation

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Tensions have increased between Minnesota and federal officials following the fatal shooting of a woman by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer in Minneapolis.
State and federal officials have given starkly different accounts of the shooting, in which an ICE agent shot U.S. citizen Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, in a residential neighborhood.

The incident drew condemnation from local officials and sparked widespread protests across the state and beyond.

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension said Thursday that it had initially agreed with the FBI to conduct a joint investigation into the shooting, but that the federal agency had “changed course” and taken full control of the investigation.
According to BCA Superintendent Drew Evans, the decision means the state agency will no longer have access to on-scene evidence, case materials or interviews.

“As a result, the BCA has reluctantly withdrawn from the investigation,” Evans said.

Protests have taken place at the scene of the shooting and elsewhere in Minneapolis. Source: Getty / Star Tribune

Keith Ellison, the state’s Democratic attorney general, told CNN that the FBI’s decision was “deeply troubling” and said state authorities could investigate with or without the federal government’s cooperation.

He added that the evidence he has seen, including some that has not yet been made public, indicates that state charges are possible.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told reporters in New York that the BCA was not “cut out” but had no jurisdiction.

Democratic Minnesota Governor Tim Walz said at a news conference that any federal investigation conducted without state involvement would likely be seen as a “whitewash.”

Agents wearing FBI uniforms and other law enforcement officers gather near a crashed vehicle in a snowy area surrounded by police tape.

The FBI is investigating the fatal shooting in Minneapolis, a major city in the state of Minnesota. Source: Getty / Stephan Maturen

“And I only say that because people in positions of power… from the president to the vice president to Kristi Noem have already passed judgment and told you things that are demonstrably untrue,” he said.

The FBI declined to comment on the BCA statement.

The ICE agent who shot Good was among 2,000 federal officers that President Donald Trump’s administration announced it would deploy to the Minneapolis area in what the Department of Homeland Security described as the “largest DHS operation ever.”

DHS officials, including Noem, defended the shooting as self-defense and accused the woman of ramming officers in an act of “domestic terrorism.”
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat, called the claim “bulls–t” and “garbage,” based on bystander videos taken of the incident that appeared to contradict the government’s narrative.
Both Frey and Walz have called on Trump, a Republican, to withdraw federal agents from the city, saying their presence is sowing chaos in the streets.
But the New York Times reported that the government had deployed more than 100 additional Customs and Border Patrol personnel from other cities in the aftermath of the shooting.

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