A federal judge has granted a temporary restraining order brought by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison against the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies, preventing them from altering or destroying evidence related to the fatal shooting Saturday of Alex Pretti by DHS agents in Minneapolis.
U.S. District Judge Eric C. Tostrud granted the order late Saturday filed by Ellison on behalf of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office.
Ellison said during a press conference Sunday that if federal officials openly defy the court order, state officials will pursue legal recourse.
Minneapolis police had called for the state BCA to investigate the shooting and the BCA says it obtained a search warrant for the scene but its investigative team was blocked by federal agents from accessing the area.
Defendants named in the order include the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Patrol, U.S. Border Control and their leadership, as well as U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel.
Also named is David Easterwood, the acting director of the St. Paul Field Office for ICE and a pastor at Cities Church in St. Paul, the church that protesters interrupted Jan. 18. Three alleged leaders of that protest were arrested Thursday and charged with conspiring to interfere with the congregation’s free exercise of religion.
Judge’s order
The defendants, including their employees, agents and anyone “acting in concert with them” are prohibited from destroying or altering evidence related to the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Pretti, an ICU nurse at the VA hospital at Fort Snelling. That includes evidence that the defendants, and those working for them, removed from the scene or have taken into their exclusive custody.
A memorandum in support of the motion argued that “plaintiffs’ irreparable harm is so weighty that any harm to the federal government does not even budge the scales.”
A hearing will be held Monday at the U.S. courthouse in St. Paul on any objections the defendants may have to the order and whether it should remain in effect. Tostrud was nominated to his seat by President Donald Trump in 2018.
In the nearly 50 lawsuits the Minnesota attorney general’s office has brought against the Trump administration, federal officials have never openly defied court orders, Ellison said Sunday when asked how state officials can know the temporary restraining order will be followed.
“And so I have every reason to believe that they will obey the court order. Now, if they don’t, we have recourse and we’ll pursue that recourse,” Ellison said.
Pretti, a Minneapolis resident, was shot and killed by federal agents Saturday morning on Nicollet Avenue near 26th Street. Officials with the Department of Homeland Security said Pretti was shot after he approached Border Patrol officers with a 9mm semiautomatic handgun. In bystander videos of the shooting, Pretti is seen with a phone in his hand but none appears to show him with a visible weapon.
Family members of Pretti said he had a permit to carry a concealed handgun in Minnesota.
“The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting,” Pretti’s family said in a statement Saturday.
Meanwhile, in sworn court filings, a doctor who offered to render aid to Pretti described how agents initially hesitated and asked him for proof of a medical license. Another person who said they were near Pretti when he was killed disputed the federal account of the confrontation.
The affidavits were filed as part of a lawsuit backed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota that accused federal agents of repeatedly violating protesters’ rights during a recent surge of immigration enforcement. The federal judge hearing that case issued an injunction earlier this month that imposed restrictions on agents. The Trump administration appealed, and an appellate court issued an administrative stay last week that blocked the injunction.
Gov. Tim Walz said at the press conference with Ellison on Sunday that Trump needs to pull ICE agents out of Minnesota before another person is killed.
“And at this point in time, I’m just asking – try for a moment to set aside the political side of it and go back and ground in the humanity of this,” Walz said. “This family has gone through enough and to have the most powerful man in the world drag their dead son with absolutely no evidence and gaslight the entire country, this is enough. And I would say, President Trump, you can end this today. Pull these folks back.”
At the same time as Walz was speaking, another news conference featured Gregory Bovino, commander of Border Patrol operations, blaming Pretti’s death on politicians and others who “vilify law enforcement.”
Minnesota’s largest public safety labor union on Sunday called on federal, state and local officials to meet and “establish clear, coordinated policies for immigration enforcement and detainers in Minnesota.”
“The lack of clarity, cooperation, communication, and coordination between federal, state, and local government is unsustainable,” said Jim Mortenson, Law Enforcement Labor Services’ executive director. “Conflicting directives are creating confusion for local law enforcement officers, eroding public trust, and straining public safety.”
Local investigators blocked
Police received a report at 9:03 a.m. Saturday of the shooting involving federal law enforcement, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said during a press conference Saturday.
O’Hara called for the state BCA to respond and conduct an investigation of the shooting. The BCA obtained a search warrant for the scene, but their investigative team was blocked by Homeland Security agents from accessing the area upon arrival, according to BCA Superintendent Drew Evans.
A judicial warrant has never been needed before, Ellison said at the Sunday press conference, calling the need for it and block of access to the scene “uncharted territory.”
“To have to go get an order from a judge to preserve that evidence is extraordinary and should alarm everyone who believes in equal justice under the law,” Ellison said.
The FBI conducted a “crime scene evaluation” and, when they left, the BCA attempted “to move in to do our own scene investigation,” Evans said Saturday, but local and state police “were unable to hold that scene and it got overrun with protesters in the area and we were not able to re-examine that scene.”
O’Hara, in a broadcast interview on CBS’s “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on Sunday, said the BCA has since returned to the scene but not before it was contaminated.
“So, unfortunately, we don’t have any official information from federal law enforcement about what has happened. Even when our officers initially responded to the scene, our watch commander was not given even the most basic information that is typical in a law enforcement involved shooting, just to ensure that there is potentially no other victims,” O’Hara said.
O’Hara said the BCA now is canvassing for additional witnesses and evidence at the scene.
Call for evidence
BCA investigators were similarly blocked from involvement in the investigation of the Jan. 7 shooting death of Renee Good.
Good, a 37-year-old resident of Minneapolis, was shot and killed by an ICE agent later identified as Jonathan Ross. The BCA was initially going to conduct a joint investigation with the FBI, but the BCA said the U.S. Attorney’s Office “reversed course” and they were informed the FBI would lead the investigation alone.
BCA officials at the time also said they tried to get access to the scene where Good was killed but were blocked by U.S. Department of Homeland Security personnel.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty has asked for video and other evidence; a link to submit it is available at tinyurl.com/mu9s65we and can be used to submit evidence into either the death of Good or Pretti as part of a joint effort by the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office and Minnesota Attorney General’s Office.
Walz, Ellison and other state officials said Sunday it is unknown if the federal agents involved in the shooting of Pretti are still in the area.
The agents are still working, but in other locations and not in Minneapolis, Bovino said.
“There’s this thing called doxing, and the safety of our employees is very important to us,” Bovino said.
Ellison said in an earlier statement Sunday that Pretti was killed “in broad daylight in front of all of our eyes.”
“Both the rule of law and the sense of justice we all carry within us demand a full, fair, and transparent investigation into his death,” Ellison said.
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