Fatal shooting involving ICE officers under investigation in Maine

A man targeted by immigration authorities was killed in a shooting involving ICE officers Monday morning in Biddeford, Maine, local and state government officials said.

Gov. Janet Mills wrote in a statement that she had been briefed on the fatal incident “involving Federal law enforcement.” She added that state police were cooperating with local and federal officials.

The Biddeford Police Department said it responded to calls about an occurrence at Pool and Hill streets that “involved U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.”

Two organizations, Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition and Presente!, identified the victim as a 26-year-old Colombian man who was authorized to work in the United States and had been issued a Social Security number.

Daniel Boucher, 71, who lives on a corner of a street where the shooting happened, told NBC News he had a direct view. He said that after hearing shots at about 7:30 a.m., he saw a large white vehicle ram a smaller one before they collided again.

Boucher said he saw an officer open the door of one of the vehicles and pull out a man whose head was bleeding profusely. He said he heard the man say, “I tried to stop.”

“Nobody should have to see what I saw,” Boucher said.

The Department of Homeland Security, ICE, local police and the state’s Department of Public Safety did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Maine’s attorney general’s office said that according to initial statements, an officer with Enforcement Removal Operations, part of ICE, was carrying out a removal order “when the subject attempted to flee in a vehicle in the direction of the officer and was fatally shot.” The attorney general’s office said it is investigating.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said that the FBI is investigating. “The shooting in Biddeford requires a full and impartial investigation of what happened,” she said in a statement.

In a news conference, Sen. Angus King, a Maine Independent, said DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin assured him that the shooting would be investigated, but also said the agents were not wearing body cameras.

He was told that body cameras have been widely distributed, but they are not everywhere, King said, “and apparently not in Biddeford, Maine.” King said he was told the cameras were coming, possibly in 45 days, “but that doesn’t help us in this case.”

The Maine shooting comes less than a week after ICE officers in Houston fatally shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was driving a van they were chasing. DHS has said the man had “weaponized” the van by trying to run over ICE officers but some Texas officials have questioned that narrative.

ICE agents also were not wearing body cameras in the Houston shooting and Salgado Araujo, a native of Mexico who lived in the U.S. over 35 years, was not the ICE’s intended target, officials said.

DHS had also said U.S. citizen Renee Good had tried to run over an ICE officer in defending their fatal confrontation her in Minneapolis in January, an account local officials disputed. Less than three weeks later, another officer fatally shot Alex Pretti, also a U.S. citizen.

ICE arrests have sharply increased since late last month. The recent rise in activity appears connected to a new nationwide mandate to make 2,000 arrests per day, rather than a surge in officers to specific places. (Source: NBC News)