New Delhi: India on Friday, January 9, voiced concern over the killing of a woman by a federal immigration agent in Minneapolis in the US.
“We are closely following the developments,” Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said. “We are concerned as we have a large Indian community in the US, including students, professionals and others,” he said at his weekly media briefing.
Renee Nicole Good was shot dead by a federal immigration agent on Wednesday, January 7, during an inspection, which she did not appear to be the target of.
She was a US citizen born in Colorado and appears to have never been charged with anything involving law enforcement beyond a traffic ticket.
Her former husband, who asked not to be named out of concern for the safety of their children, said Good had just dropped off her six-year-old son at school on January 7 and was driving home with her current partner when they encountered a group of ICE agents on a snowy street in Minneapolis, where they had moved last year from Kansas City, Missouri.
Following the incident, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin claimed the woman “weaponised her vehicle, attempting to run over our law enforcement officers in an attempt to kill them.”
However, a video taken by bystanders posted to social media shows an officer approaching her car, demanding she open the door and grabbing the handle. When she begins to pull forward, a different ICE officer standing in front of the vehicle pulls his weapon and immediately fires at least two shots into the vehicle at close range.
It is unclear what operation the ICE was conducting at the time of the incident.
The shooting resulted in major outrage from the public, and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey accused the DHS of spinning the narrative and asked the ICE agents to leave the state.
Meanwhile, Vice-President JD Vance blamed the shooting on the victim, saying, “I can believe that her death is a tragedy, while also recognising that it’s a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left who has marshalled an entire movement — a lunatic fringe — against our law enforcement officers.”
Just a day after the Minnesota shooting, federal immigration officers shot and wounded two people in a vehicle outside a hospital in Portland, Oregon.
The Department of Homeland Security described the vehicle’s passenger as “a Venezuelan illegal alien affiliated with the transnational Tren de Aragua prostitution ring” who had been involved in a recent shooting in Portland.
It further added that agents had identified themselves to the vehicle occupants on January 8, but the driver tried to run them over, resulting in the agent firing a “defensive shot.” The victims were able to flee the scene, but their conditions were not immediately known.
(With inputs from agencies)
