ICE Agents and Qualified Immunity: Why Accountability Remains Elusive

Last Wednesday morning in Minneapolis, a 37-year-old mother named Renee Nicole Good became another statistic. An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent named Jonathan Ross fired multiple shots into her vehicle, killing her. She joined at least 25 other people shot dead by ICE agents since 2015. Not a single agent has faced criminal charges.

That's not hyperbole. That's not a claim needing verification. That's the factual landscape of law enforcement accountability in immigration enforcement, and it exposes a fundamental problem baked into how federal law protects armed government agents.

You're about to learn why.

The gap between shootings and accountability isn't accidental. It's structural. It stems from legal doctrines that sound reasonable in theory but function as a shield against consequences in practice. And the people most affected are immigrants, their families, and communities already skeptical of federal authority.

This article walks through the evidence, the legal mechanisms that enable impunity, the patterns in these shootings, and what actually happens when investigations conclude. By the end, you'll understand not just what happened in Minneapolis, but why investigations into federal agent shootings almost never result in criminal charges. And more importantly, you'll see how this connects to broader questions about accountability, force, and the boundaries of federal power.

Let's start with the data.

TL; DR

• No criminal charges: Zero ICE agents have faced criminal indictment for shootings since 2015, despite 25+ deaths
• Qualified immunity protects agents: Federal doctrine shields agents from civil suits, making accountability civil rather than criminal
• Moving vehicles account for most cases: At least 19 shootings involved vehicles, with 10 deaths and six injuries
• Bystander danger is routine: ICE shootings occurred in public 22 times with civilians nearby
• Self-defense claim is nearly unrefutable: The "reasonableness" standard is evaluated from the agent's perspective, not objective reality

From 2015 to 2021, ICE agent shootings involving vehicles resulted in 10 fatalities and 6 injuries, highlighting a concerning pattern of outcomes. Estimated data for 'No Harm' cases.

The Scope of ICE Agent Shootings: More Than You Know

The actual number of people shot by ICE agents remains difficult to pin down, which itself is a problem. Immigration and Customs Enforcement doesn't publish comprehensive public data on shootings. Reporters, researchers, and civil rights organizations have had to piece together information through Freedom of Information Act requests, lawsuits, media reports, and interviews.

Between 2015 and 2021, at least 25 people were killed by ICE agent shootings. That's nearly four people per year. For context, the FBI's use of force data shows federal agents fire fewer bullets in a year than some local police departments fire in a week. ICE operates with less transparency than almost any law enforcement agency, which means the actual numbers could be higher.

What makes these shootings particularly concerning isn't just the frequency, but the patterns.

In at least 19 cases, moving vehicles were involved. Vehicles appear as a threat in ICE shooting narratives with remarkable consistency. An agent perceives threat from a car. The agent believes the vehicle might be used as a weapon or as an escape mechanism. The agent fires. This happens in seconds, and the narrative almost always ends with self-defense claims that stand unchallenged in any courtroom.

Ten of those vehicle-involved shootings resulted in deaths. Six resulted in injuries where the person survived. That's 16 people harmed when ICE agents encountered moving cars. Think about how many times law enforcement nationwide encounters vehicles. Think about how rare fatal shootings actually are in most police agencies. Now understand that ICE's rate appears abnormal.

In at least seven cases, the person actually shot by an ICE agent wasn't the intended target of the enforcement action. Imagine entering a room planning to arrest one person and shooting someone else instead. That's happened at least seven times in ICE operations. The person shot was simply present, in the wrong place, at a moment when an agent perceived threat.

Public spaces complicate things further. ICE agents have shot at people 22 times in public areas with bystanders nearby. That means 22 separate incidents where civilians weren't wearing badges could have been hit by rounds intended for someone else. No bystander deaths are documented, but the risk was real and repeated.

Three US citizens were shot by ICE task forces. Not three immigrants. Three actual US citizens. The distinction matters because it shows this isn't only an immigration enforcement problem. It's a federal law enforcement problem that crosses citizenship lines.

And in at least a dozen cases, evidence suggests the person shot was unarmed. Sometimes documented as having "hands/feet/body" as the weapon. Other times, no weapon was ever found or claimed. These are the cases where the self-defense argument should theoretically weaken. Yet none proceeded to criminal charges.

How Qualified Immunity Functions as a Shield

Qualified immunity is a legal doctrine created by the Supreme Court to protect government officials from civil lawsuits. It sounds neutral on paper. The idea is that officials shouldn't face constant litigation for good-faith decisions made while performing their duties.

But the application is radically one-sided.

Qualified immunity works like this: a person harmed by a federal agent can sue. But the agent is immune from that suit unless the person harmed can point to an earlier case with nearly identical facts where a court already ruled the conduct unconstitutional. If no such case exists, immunity applies, and the suit gets dismissed before trial. The bar is absurdly high.

Suppose an ICE agent shoots someone in a vehicle. That person's family wants to sue. They'd need to find a case with a vehicle shooting where the victim was similarly unarmed, the circumstances were substantially the same, and a court had already ruled that such conduct violates the Constitution. If no prior case exists, immunity applies automatically.

Because immunity is so easy to obtain, few cases develop the factual record that would create future "clearly established law." And because few cases develop that record, immunity stays easy to obtain. It's a circular problem that systematically prevents accountability.

Two Supreme Court cases made this worse for anyone harmed by immigration agents. Mesa v. Hernandez in 2020 and Egbert v. Boule in 2022 further cemented federal agents' immunity from civil suits. These cases involved immigration enforcement scenarios. The Supreme Court essentially said private citizens have almost no ability to sue federal agents for harm, even when that harm involves physical injury.

What does this mean practically? Families of people shot by ICE agents can't easily win civil lawsuits. Civil accountability is largely foreclosed. That pushes the question to criminal prosecution, which brings us to the other problem.

Since 2015, at least 25 people have been killed by ICE agents, with no agents facing criminal charges. This highlights significant challenges in holding agents accountable.

The Self-Defense Standard: Why It's Nearly Impossible to Challenge

When an ICE agent shoots someone, the immediate narrative is self-defense. The agent feared for their safety. The suspect posed a threat. The force was necessary and proportional.

This statement is almost impossible to refute in practice, and the legal structure explains why.

Law enforcement uses what's called the "objectively reasonable" standard for deadly force. An officer can use deadly force if it was "objectively reasonable and necessary." The critical word is "objectively," which sounds like it means based on facts. It actually means evaluated from the perspective of a trained law enforcement officer in that moment.

It's not evaluated by asking: was the force actually necessary according to facts we can now verify? It's evaluated by asking: would a reasonable officer perceive a threat at that moment?

These are different tests. The first requires checking facts. The second requires checking perceptions. The second is far easier to satisfy because perceptions are internal and impossible to completely invalidate.

Suppose an agent claims the person shot was reaching for a weapon. The person is now dead, often in circumstances with limited video evidence or eyewitnesses. The agent testifies they saw motion toward a waistband. The prosecutor (who works with police regularly) must now prove beyond reasonable doubt that no reasonable officer would perceive such motion as threatening. That's nearly impossible. People move in countless ways. Reaching motions are common. Reasonable officers can perceive threat in ambiguous situations.

Federal prosecutors are also notoriously deferential to federal agents. They work together on terrorism cases, organized crime, major investigations. They have professional relationships. Federal agents are their colleagues in the law enforcement community. This creates psychological dynamics that make aggressive prosecution unlikely even when evidence might support it.

State prosecutors sometimes take more aggressive stances, but the complexity of federal jurisdiction often means that federal authorities get first crack at investigation and make decisions about whether to refer cases for state prosecution. By the time cases reach state prosecutors, federal investigators have already concluded no crime occurred. That's a tough starting point.

Vehicle Shootings: A Pattern That Defies Explanation

If you were designing an environment where shootings should be rare, you'd probably avoid situations with vehicles. Vehicles move. Drivers make unexpected maneuvers. Visibility is limited. Other people might be nearby. Children might be present. Yet ICE shootings involving vehicles happen repeatedly, and they follow a consistent pattern.

The pattern goes like this: ICE agents approach a vehicle. They're attempting to make an arrest or conduct an enforcement action. The driver, often perceiving federal agents as a threat (either because they're undocumented or because they know their rights), doesn't want to stop or doesn't understand what's happening. The driver accelerates or attempts to drive away.

The agent, now facing a vehicle moving toward or away from them, perceives the vehicle as a weapon. A car is objectively dangerous. A car moving at speed can cause serious injury or death. The agent fires. The agent is now within the "objectively reasonable" zone because vehicles are genuinely dangerous.

But this creates a perverse incentive. Agents might actually be incentivized to interpret vehicle movement as threatening because vehicles are unambiguously dangerous once they're moving. The reasonable officer standard is easier to satisfy when the suspected weapon is actually dangerous.

In at least ten vehicle shootings, people were killed. In six, people were injured but survived. One person was killed by an ICE shooting from the driver's side and passenger's side of a car. That's crossfire in a vehicle scenario. That's the kind of detail that suggests either lack of training or disregard for bystander safety or both.

Consider the mechanics: ICE agents attempting to stop a vehicle, vehicle moving, agents firing into vehicle. The vehicle becomes less controllable. The driver is now injured or dead. The vehicle might accelerate uncontrollably. Bystanders nearby are in danger from the vehicle itself. Yet these scenarios are almost never investigated as excessive force cases. They're investigated as self-defense cases.

The vehicle cases also reveal something about who gets shot. Many vehicle shootings involve immigrants or people from immigrant communities. Some involve people who may not understand English clearly. If an ICE agent approaches, shouting commands in English, and a driver doesn't immediately stop, the narrative becomes: driver refused to stop, driver posed threat, force was necessary.

But the reality might be: driver didn't hear, didn't understand, was panicking, didn't know it was law enforcement. Once a vehicle is moving away from an agent, the self-defense claim becomes almost automatic.

When the Person Shot Isn't the Target: Collateral Damage in Federal Enforcement

In at least seven documented cases, ICE agents shot someone who wasn't the intended target of the enforcement action. The person was simply present during an operation. They were in the vicinity. They became a casualty of federal enforcement.

This is extraordinary and almost never discussed. You would think that shooting the wrong person would trigger immediate investigation and likely criminal charges. Yet these cases proceed identically to cases where the correct person was shot: investigation concludes self-defense, no charges filed.

One case involved an agent shooting a bystander at a location where enforcement was ongoing. The person shot had no connection to the enforcement target. They were simply in a dangerous situation created by ICE's presence and operations. Yet the investigation concluded the shooting was justified.

This pattern reveals something crucial about how self-defense is evaluated. Self-defense requires that force be used against someone posing a threat. If you shoot someone who wasn't a threat and wasn't the target, self-defense becomes impossible to claim. Yet these cases still don't result in charges.

The explanation must be that investigations conclude either: the agent reasonably believed the person posed a threat (even though they weren't the target), or the agent's identity as law enforcement makes almost any shooting defensible within the internal investigation framework.

Neither explanation is satisfying. If an agent shoots someone who wasn't the target and wasn't threatening the agent, that's a tragic mistake that should trigger some accountability mechanism. It doesn't.

Local law enforcement generally has more layers of accountability compared to federal agencies, with higher levels of civilian review, media attention, and oversight. (Estimated data)

Public Shootings With Bystanders: Acceptable Risk?

Twenty-two times, ICE agents shot at people in public areas with civilians nearby. That's 22 separate incidents where bystanders were present. No documented bystander deaths resulted, which we should be grateful for. But the acceptance of this risk is remarkable.

When NYPD or LAPD shoot in public areas with bystanders nearby, those departments face significant scrutiny and often implement new policies. New York City's police department has comprehensive guidelines about shooting in populated areas because bystander safety is prioritized.

ICE doesn't appear to operate under similar constraints. Or if policies exist, they're not preventing shootings in public. Twenty-two times is a pattern. That's not statistical noise. That's a repeated operational choice to use force in circumstances where innocent people could be harmed.

The liability exposure alone is staggering. If a bystander had been killed in any of these 22 incidents, ICE would face massive civil exposure. The fact that no bystander deaths occurred is luck, not evidence of safe practices.

Luck, however, isn't a long-term strategy for public safety. Eventually, in a large enough dataset of public shootings with bystanders nearby, someone innocent gets hurt. The more you play with fire, the more often you'll get burned.

Yet these shootings are investigated identically to other shootings. The presence of bystanders and the risk to civilian safety don't appear in investigation files as factors making the shooting more questionable. Instead, investigations focus narrowly on whether the agent feared for their safety from the person they shot.

The bystander reality gets completely sidelined.

Federal Investigations: The Process That Protects

When an ICE agent shoots someone, who investigates? Typically, the FBI takes the lead on federal agent-involved shootings. The FBI conducts interviews, collects evidence, and prepares a report. That report goes to a federal prosecutor, usually a U. S. Attorney in that jurisdiction.

The U. S. Attorney then decides whether to pursue criminal charges. U. S. Attorneys have enormous discretion. They're not elected. They're appointed. They work closely with federal agents on major cases. They have strong professional relationships with the agencies they oversee.

In immigration enforcement cases involving ICE, the U. S. Attorney might not have particularly strong relationships because ICE investigations are often lower-priority than terrorism or organized crime cases. But the dynamic still applies: federal prosecutors are generally deferential to federal agents.

Federal agent-involved shooting investigations almost never result in criminal charges. That's not speculation. That's what the data shows. Across all federal agencies, criminal indictments for agent-involved shootings are extraordinarily rare. When they do occur, they usually involve extraordinary circumstances: clear evidence of a crime, witnesses willing to testify, or political pressure making prosecution impossible to avoid.

ICE shootings have had essentially none of these factors. No witnesses have come forward with testimony directly contradicting agent accounts. No politicians have created pressure to prosecute. No evidence has been so clear that prosecutors had no choice.

Instead, investigations follow a familiar pattern:

1. The shooting occurs
2. Initial scene investigation and evidence collection
3. FBI investigates
4. Interviews with the agent and witnesses
5. U. S. Attorney reviews the investigation
6. Conclusion: self-defense is justified, no charges warranted
7. Case closed

This process is thorough in some respects. Evidence is collected. Interviews happen. But the process is fundamentally designed to evaluate whether criminal conduct occurred, not whether the shooting was a good decision or whether policies should change.

State prosecutors could potentially intervene. State laws against murder, assault, or negligence could apply even to federal agents. But state prosecutors typically defer to federal investigations when the person shot was a federal responsibility (like an enforcement target). By the time states might assert jurisdiction, the federal conclusion of self-defense is already public, already set.

The Extraction From Joint Investigations: Minneapolis 2024

The Renee Nicole Good shooting revealed something important about how federal authorities manage investigations into federal agent shootings. After Ross shot Good, Minnesota's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension attempted to conduct a joint investigation with the FBI.

Joint investigations are valuable because they balance federal and state perspectives. State prosecutors bring local accountability. Federal prosecutors bring federal authority. The combination can sometimes overcome the default deference to agents.

But just one day after the shooting, the U. S. Attorney's Office told the BCA that the FBI would be the sole investigator. The BCA was removed from the investigation. The BCA would no longer have access to evidence, scene materials, or investigative interviews.

This is significant because it's the federal government asserting exclusive jurisdiction and controlling the investigation process. It means the federal prosecutor gets to decide what evidence the state sees. It means the state prosecutor can't independently evaluate evidence. It means federal control is absolute.

However, this doesn't actually prevent Minnesota's Attorney General or Hennepin County Attorney from conducting their own investigation. State law still applies. A homicide investigation doesn't become federal just because a federal agent pulled the trigger. State prosecutors have authority to investigate too.

But that's not what happened. Instead, the county attorney asked for evidence submissions from the public. The state essentially deferred to federal investigation, which is the pattern these situations follow. Federal authority moves first, states follow.

Governor Tim Walz encouraged people to document the shooting, to gather evidence, to use available tools to hold ICE accountable. That's encouraging citizen action, which is good. But it's also an implicit acknowledgment that official investigative channels were not fully available.

Since 2015, ICE agents have been involved in 25 fatal incidents without any facing criminal charges, highlighting systemic accountability issues.

Unarmed Shootings: The Cases Where Evidence Might Matter Most

In at least a dozen ICE shootings, evidence suggests the person shot was unarmed. Some cases documented the weapon as "hands/feet/body," which is an extraordinary designation. Other cases found no weapon at all despite investigation.

Unarmed shootings are the cases where the self-defense standard should theoretically be weakest. If someone is unarmed, they're less likely to pose an immediate deadly threat. If an unarmed person is shot by a law enforcement officer, that's a scenario demanding unusually careful review.

Yet unarmed shooting cases proceed to investigation conclusions just like armed shooting cases. The investigation concludes self-defense. No charges result. The pattern is identical.

How does an agent's self-defense claim succeed when the person shot was unarmed? The typical explanation is that the agent reasonably believed the person had a weapon even though no weapon was found. Or the agent reasonably feared a weapon even without evidence of one. Or the person's actions (reaching, lunging, sudden movement) created a reasonable perception of threat despite lack of actual weapon.

All of these explanations are internally consistent with the self-defense standard. An agent doesn't need to be correct about whether a weapon exists. The agent only needs to have reasonably believed a weapon might exist or that a threat existed. That reasonable belief standard is nearly impossible to prove wrong after the fact.

Suppose an agent shoots an unarmed person and claims they saw the person reaching toward their waistband. No gun is found. The person's family says they were simply putting their hands on their stomach in distress. Who's right? The investigation relies heavily on the agent's testimony about what they perceived. The person shot is dead and can't describe what they were doing.

This asymmetry in investigation is profound. The person who could contradict the agent's perception is dead. The investigation evaluates the agent's perception without the counternarrative the victim would provide.

Three US Citizens: Why Citizenship Shouldn't Matter But Does

ICE has shot and killed or wounded three US citizens. This matters because citizenship shapes the narrative. Immigration enforcement is supposed to target immigrants. When ICE shoots citizens, the legitimacy of the enforcement action becomes questionable. Yet these cases are investigated identically to cases involving immigrants.

One citizen was shot during an ICE enforcement operation. Another was injured. A third was killed. In each case, ICE was supposedly there to enforce immigration law. In each case, the citizen became a casualty of that enforcement.

Citizen cases are important because they demonstrate the problem isn't just about immigration enforcement. It's about federal enforcement generally. When federal agents can shoot citizens—who have full constitutional protection and no ambiguity about rights—without consequences, the broader system is indicted.

Yet citizen cases don't result in charges either. The self-defense standard applies equally. The investigation process is identical. The conclusion is almost always the same: officer acted reasonably.

This suggests the problem isn't about confusion regarding immigration law or authority. The problem is about federal law enforcement's exceptional ability to use force without accountability, regardless of the target's citizenship or immigration status.

It's a federal law enforcement problem, not merely an immigration problem.

Patterns Across Presidential Administrations: Consistency of Non-Accountability

ICE agent shootings occurred across three presidential administrations: Obama, Trump, and Biden. The patterns of investigation and non-accountability remained remarkably consistent regardless of which administration was in power.

This consistency is significant because it suggests the problem isn't political. It's structural. It's baked into how federal law enforcement investigations work. It's embedded in qualified immunity doctrine. It's rooted in prosecution incentives. It transcends political leadership.

During the Obama administration, ICE shootings occurred but received limited public attention. The Trump administration saw increased immigration enforcement and thus more operational activity, potentially more shootings. The Biden administration has continued immigration enforcement despite campaign rhetoric about changing enforcement approaches.

Across all three administrations, the investigation outcomes are essentially identical: no criminal charges. Different presidents. Different policy priorities. Identical accountability outcomes.

This consistency suggests that changing individual administration policies won't solve the problem. The problem is systemic. It's in the legal doctrines protecting federal agents. It's in the investigation procedures. It's in the prosecutor incentives. It's in qualified immunity. It's in the reasonableness standard. All of these persist regardless of who's president.

Reform would require legislative action to change how federal agents are investigated, how qualified immunity functions, or how the self-defense standard is evaluated. Those are big changes. They're not happening at the federal level any time soon.

Estimated data suggests that the majority of federal agent-involved shooting investigations conclude with no charges filed, highlighting the rarity of criminal indictments in these cases.

Media Investigations and What Visual Evidence Reveals

In the Minneapolis case, outlets like The New York Times and The Washington Post reconstructed the shooting using videos from multiple angles. Those videos revealed apparent contradictions between official narratives and what actually happened on camera.

This is important because it shows that visual evidence sometimes contradicts official accounts. Yet contradictions don't result in charges. The investigations presumably reviewed the same videos. The investigations reached conclusions anyway.

The fact that media can reconstruct events with publicly available videos, but official investigations don't reach different conclusions, suggests investigations either aren't using available evidence effectively, or investigations are biased toward accepting official narratives.

Video evidence creates an interesting dynamic for accountability. When videos exist and show something, the official account becomes harder to maintain. But this only matters if the investigation is motivated to question the official account, which federal investigations typically aren't.

The Minneapolis case had multiple videos. That's actually exceptional. Many ICE shootings occur with limited video evidence. When video does exist, its existence sometimes contradicts what happened. But contradictions don't break through the self-defense defense.

The Role of Qualified Immunity in Foreclosing Civil Accountability

Qualified immunity doesn't just protect agents from lawsuits. It systemically shifts accountability away from civil courts, where some juries might find against agents, toward criminal courts, where prosecutors have extraordinary discretion and almost never charge agents.

Civil lawsuits can succeed even when criminal prosecution would fail because the burden of proof is lower. A civil jury might find that an agent used excessive force based on the preponderance of the evidence (more likely than not). A criminal jury must convict based on proof beyond reasonable doubt (a much higher standard).

But qualified immunity prevents civil cases from even reaching juries. Cases get dismissed on immunity grounds before trial. Before evidence is presented. Before juries decide anything.

This leaves criminal prosecution as the only avenue. And criminal prosecution almost never happens.

The effect is almost complete impunity. Families can't sue civilly because of qualified immunity. Criminal prosecution almost never happens. There's no accountability mechanism left.

Reforming qualified immunity could help, but it wouldn't fix the entire problem. Even without qualified immunity, federal agents would still benefit from investigation deference and prosecution discretion. But at least civil juries would have an opportunity to weigh evidence and render judgment.

Right now, civil juries never get that chance.

Investigative Discretion and the Decision Not to Charge

When the FBI investigates an ICE shooting, the agents involved are never fully independent. The FBI is another federal law enforcement agency. ICE is another federal law enforcement agency. They're part of the same system.

This creates systemic bias toward protecting the system. Federal agents investigating federal agents have incentives to be careful about charging other federal agents because it creates precedent. If one federal agent can be criminally charged for a shooting, other federal agents might also face charges. Better to maintain the standard that shootings are almost never criminal, that self-defense claims are almost always credible.

State investigators investigating federal agents have fewer conflicts because they're from a different system. But state investigators often lack the resources and expertise to effectively investigate federal cases. Federal cases are complex. Federal agents know federal procedures. State investigators are disadvantaged.

The ideal investigative structure would involve completely independent investigators from outside the federal system. Maybe federal prosecutors investigating state agents, and state prosecutors investigating federal agents. That would create genuine independence.

Instead, federal agents investigate federal agents. The bias is baked in.

Estimated data suggests that despite numerous investigations and public outcry, high-profile ICE shooting cases rarely result in criminal charges.

What Would Actually Create Accountability

Accountability for federal agent shootings would require changes at multiple levels:

First, qualified immunity would need significant reform. Not elimination necessarily, but the "clearly established law" standard would need to become easier to satisfy. Immunity could be available in close cases, but not in cases with clear violations.

Second, investigations would need to be independent. Completely separate from the agencies involved. That might mean creating specialized federal units that investigate only federal agent misconduct, staffed by people with no career ties to the agencies under investigation.

Third, prosecutors would need different incentives. Federal prosecutors could face political pressure to prosecute federal agents in high-profile cases. Or they could be required to explain publicly their decisions not to charge. Transparency creates pressure.

Fourth, the self-defense standard itself could be tightened. Instead of "objectively reasonable," the standard could require that the shooting was necessary and proportional based on facts as they actually were, not as the agent perceived them. That's a harder standard to satisfy.

Fifth, states could assert more jurisdiction. Federal prosecution isn't exclusive. States can prosecute federal agents under state law. If state prosecutors began investigating federal agent shootings as homicides or assault, there would be an alternative accountability path.

Sixth, civil accountability could matter more if qualified immunity were reformed. Even if criminal charges were rare, civil juries could create consequences. Civil lawsuits could establish precedent and create pressure to change practices.

None of these changes are happening. None are imminent. The structures remain in place. The patterns of non-accountability persist.

Looking Forward: Will Minneapolis Change Anything?

The Renee Nicole Good shooting is high-profile. It occurred in a major media market. Videos exist showing apparent contradictions to official narratives. The victim was female. The victim was a mother. The circumstances are sympathetic.

If any ICE shooting case had the potential to break through the pattern of non-accountability, this might be it. Yet the pattern is extraordinarily durable. Despite high-profile cases, despite video evidence, despite media investigations, despite public outcry, the system has produced zero criminal charges across all three administrations.

What would have to happen for Minnesota to charge Jonathan Ross?

The U. S. Attorney would have to decline prosecution. Then state prosecutors would have to assert jurisdiction. Then they would have to believe they could prove the shooting wasn't justified self-defense beyond reasonable doubt. That's a very high bar given the reasonableness standard, which is evaluated from the agent's perspective.

State prosecutors might investigate independently. They might develop evidence. But the federal conclusion that the shooting was self-defense would cast a shadow over state prosecution. If the FBI already investigated and concluded no crime occurred, state prosecution becomes harder politically and legally.

Most likely outcome: federal investigation concludes self-defense, no charges filed. State prosecutors decline to investigate independently. The case becomes another data point in the pattern.

That's not cynicism. That's what the data shows. That's what happens repeatedly. That's the system operating as it currently functions.

The Broader Context of Federal Law Enforcement Accountability

ICE shootings are part of a larger pattern of federal law enforcement accountability issues. DEA agents have shot people with minimal consequences. FBI agents have shot people without criminal charges. USCBP agents have killed people, particularly at the border.

The federal law enforcement community generally operates under accountability standards that seem impossibly low from a public perspective. Federal agents can use force in ways that would trigger local investigations if local police did the same thing.

This isn't because federal agents are necessarily less careful. Federal agents often receive better training than local police. Federal agents often operate in genuinely dangerous circumstances involving violent criminals.

But accountability for federal agents hasn't kept pace with accountability for local police. Local police departments face civilian review boards. Local police department shootings get media attention. Local police officers face criminal prosecution more frequently than federal agents, even though federal agents probably use force more rarely.

The gap is structural. Federal agents are protected by qualified immunity. Federal investigations are conducted by federal agencies. Federal prosecutors decide charges. It's a closed federal system.

Local police operate in more open systems. State prosecutors can charge them. Civil lawsuits can proceed. Civilian review occurs. Multiple layers of oversight exist.

Federal agents have fewer layers of oversight.

If federal officers are indeed less dangerous (and the data is mixed on this), then increasing accountability shouldn't be problematic. Better accountability might actually improve practices by creating incentives to follow procedure more carefully.

Immigration Enforcement and Force

Immigration enforcement is inherently fraught because it involves pursuing people who are vulnerable, often don't speak English well, and may not understand their rights or what's happening when federal agents approach.

ICE operates in communities, in homes, on streets. The use of force in these contexts is different from the use of force in a prison, at an airport, or during a narcotics investigation. Immigration enforcement brings force into immigration communities, where residents may have legitimate fears of detention and deportation.

When ICE approaches with weapons, commands in English, and demands compliance, people from non-English-speaking communities may not understand what's happening. They may panic. They may run. They may not understand that refusing to stop can result in lethal force.

This creates a tragic pattern where communication failures lead to force escalations that lead to shootings. Someone who simply didn't understand English commands ends up shot. Someone who panicked ends up dead.

The self-defense claims in these cases might be legally defensible. The person did something the agent interpreted as threatening. From the agent's perspective, fear might have been reasonable.

But from a systemic perspective, we've designed a system where language barriers and cultural differences combine with weapons and authority to produce deadly outcomes with no criminal consequences.

That's not something that should be acceptable.

The Role of Bystanders and Community Documentation

In many ICE shootings, the only witnesses are ICE agents themselves, or bystanders. Bystanders are often afraid to come forward because they may themselves be vulnerable to immigration enforcement.

If you're undocumented, witnessing an ICE shooting creates a conflict: help with investigation or stay hidden to avoid arrest. Many bystanders stay hidden. That deprives investigations of independent witnesses who might contradict official accounts.

This is a practical consequence of immigration enforcement. ICE operates in communities where many residents have reason to fear ICE. That fear makes investigations harder. It creates information asymmetries that favor official accounts.

Governor Walz's encouragement for residents to document shootings attempts to address this by asking people to gather evidence. Phone videos, photos, whatever's available. The evidence might not be admissible in criminal trials, but it's valuable for public understanding and potentially for independent civil investigation.

Community documentation creates pressure even when official investigations don't result in charges. Video evidence that contradicts official accounts can generate media attention, public scrutiny, political pressure.

The evidence won't create criminal charges on its own. But it can create consequences that other accountability mechanisms don't.

Conclusion: Structural Problems Require Structural Solutions

ICE agents have killed more than 25 people since 2015. Not a single agent faces criminal charges. That's not an aberration. That's a pattern. That's a system functioning as designed.

The pattern exists because of how federal law enforcement investigations work. It exists because of qualified immunity. It exists because of the self-defense standard. It exists because federal prosecutors have extraordinary discretion. It exists because states defer to federal investigations. It exists because civil accountability is foreclosed.

Each of these mechanisms is individually justifiable. Together, they create near-total impunity.

The Renee Nicole Good shooting and the Jonathan Ross case exemplify this system. Video evidence shows events. Official investigations review the same evidence. Investigations conclude self-defense. No charges follow. The case becomes another data point.

Meanwhile, Renee Nicole Good is dead. She was 37. She was a mother. She became one of 25 people shot by ICE agents without any agent facing criminal charges.

Reform would require legislative action at the federal level. It would require Congress changing how qualified immunity works, how federal investigations function, how federal prosecutors are incentivized. It would require states asserting more jurisdiction and conducting independent investigations. It would require federal agencies implementing stronger use-of-force policies.

None of this is happening. The political will doesn't exist. Immigration enforcement remains popular or at least non-controversial enough to resist accountability measures. Federal law enforcement protects its own.

The gap between what happened and what's being done about it reveals something important about federal accountability. Federal law enforcement operates differently than local law enforcement. Federal agents face fewer consequences than local police. The public has less oversight. The system is more closed.

Until the structural problems are addressed, the pattern will continue. More shootings. More deaths. No charges. The people most affected will be immigrants and communities serving immigrants, populations that have limited political power to demand accountability.

That's where we are. That's what the evidence shows. That's what needs to change.

FAQ

What is qualified immunity and why does it matter for ICE shootings?

Qualified immunity is a legal doctrine that protects federal government officials from civil lawsuits unless the person suing can show that the official violated a "clearly established" constitutional right. For ICE agent shootings, this means families can't easily sue the agents civilly, shifting accountability to criminal prosecution, which almost never happens. This doctrine significantly limits civil accountability for federal agents.

How are ICE agent shootings investigated?

When an ICE agent shoots someone, the FBI typically investigates and prepares a report. That report goes to a federal prosecutor, usually a U. S. Attorney in the relevant jurisdiction. The U. S. Attorney then decides whether to pursue criminal charges. State prosecutors could theoretically investigate under state law, but typically defer to federal investigation, which makes criminal charges extremely unlikely.

Why do self-defense claims almost always succeed in ICE shooting cases?

Self-defense evaluations use an "objectively reasonable" standard, which means the force is judged from the perspective of a trained law enforcement officer at that moment. This standard is nearly impossible to disprove because it's about what the agent perceived, not what was objectively true. If the agent reasonably believed they faced a threat, self-defense applies even if no actual threat existed.

How many people have been killed by ICE agents and how many agents have faced charges?

Since 2015, at least 25 people have been killed by ICE agent shootings, with another case in 2024. Zero ICE agents have faced criminal charges for any of these shootings. This pattern persists across three presidential administrations, suggesting structural rather than political causes.

Why are vehicle-involved shootings so common in ICE enforcement?

Vehicles appear in at least 19 ICE shootings because vehicles are inherently dangerous once moving. When ICE agents try to stop a vehicle and the driver doesn't comply, agents perceive the vehicle as a weapon. The self-defense standard is easier to satisfy when the threat (a moving vehicle) is objectively dangerous, creating an incentive structure that makes vehicle shootings more likely.

What would create actual accountability for ICE shootings?

Accountability would require multiple structural changes: reforming qualified immunity to make civil suits more viable, creating independent investigations outside the federal system, changing the self-defense standard to emphasize objective facts over agent perception, empowering state prosecutors to investigate independently, and creating transparency requirements that force prosecutors to explain decisions not to charge. Currently, none of these changes are occurring.

Can state prosecutors investigate and charge federal agents independently?

Yes, state law applies regardless of federal jurisdiction. State prosecutors can investigate ICE shootings as homicides or assaults under state law. However, state prosecutors typically defer to federal investigation, and federal conclusions of self-defense make state prosecution politically and legally difficult. State prosecutors almost never assert independent jurisdiction in these cases.

Why does the presence of bystanders in ICE shootings not result in increased scrutiny?

ICE has shot at people in public areas with bystanders nearby 22 times. Although these shootings carry exceptional risk of harming innocent people, investigations focus narrowly on whether the agent feared for their safety from the person shot. Bystander risk doesn't appear in investigation files as a factor making the shooting more problematic, so the dangerous practice continues without additional accountability.

What happened with the Renee Nicole Good case and did federal/state dynamics affect the investigation?

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension began a joint investigation with the FBI after ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot Good, but was removed from the investigation after just one day when the U. S. Attorney's Office asserted exclusive federal jurisdiction. While state prosecutors could still investigate independently, this federal assertion of control is typical, and state prosecutors usually defer, making state accountability mechanisms ineffective.

Why are ICE shootings different from local police shootings in terms of accountability?

Local police face civilian review boards, media attention, and state prosecution. Local law enforcement operates in more transparent systems with multiple layers of oversight. Federal agents are protected by qualified immunity, investigated by federal agencies, and prosecuted by federal prosecutors who have different incentive structures. This closed federal system produces fewer consequences than local policing accountability systems, even though federal agents should theoretically face equal or greater scrutiny.

Key Takeaways

• 25+ people killed by ICE agents since 2015 with zero criminal charges filed, across three presidential administrations
• Qualified immunity forecloses civil accountability, shifting all responsibility to criminal prosecution, which almost never happens
• The 'objectively reasonable' self-defense standard is evaluated from the agent's perspective, making it nearly impossible to disprove after the fact
• Vehicle-involved shootings account for 19 incidents with 10 deaths, revealing systematic risks from enforcement tactics
• Federal investigations are conducted by federal agencies and prosecuted by federal prosecutors with professional relationships to the agents, creating systemic bias

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