Here's the latest
• Officials are calling for transparent investigations after a man was fatally shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Biddeford, Maine, yesterday – just days after a federal agent fatally shot a Mexican immigrant during a traffic stop in Houston.
• Killed in Maine was 26-year-old father Joan Sebastian Guerrero from Colombia, a neighbor said. He was authorized to work in the US and was issued a Social Security number, the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition said. He wasn’t the target of the immigration operation, Sen. Angus King said.
• An ICE officer opened fire “fearing for public safety” as the victim “attempted to flee the scene” in a vehicle, the Department of Homeland Security said without detailing why the officer believed Guerrero posed a risk.
Some previous DHS claims about moving vehicles in shootings have fallen apart
The Department of Homeland Security has been involved in several shootings during President Donald Trump’s second term in which officers have engaged the drivers of vehicles, including, most recently, Monday’s shooting in Maine that killed Joan Sebastian Guerrero.
In several of those cases, the agency claimed the drivers “weaponized” their vehicles against an officer or officers prior to the shooting. Those statements have sometimes fallen apart under scrutiny. (DHS notably did not make this claim regarding Monday’s shooting in Maine; the agency said the officer who shot Guerrero was “fearing for public safety.”)
Shortly after an ICE officer killed Renee Good in January, DHS claimed that Good had “weaponized” her car and in what the agency described as an “act of domestic terrorism.” A review of video of the shooting showed that Good, though appearing to clip the officer with her vehicle, tried steering sharply away from him before she was shot.
In October, Marimar Martinez had been accused by the agency of “aggressively and erratically” pursuing, and ramming, a Customs and Border Protection agent prior to being shot several times.
But US District Judge Georgia Alexakis later found several inconsistencies in the government’s case that raised questions “about the truthfulness of the statements made by the Border Patrol agent who shot Ms. Martinez.” A criminal case against Martinez fell apart.
The agency similarly claimed that Lorenzo Salgado Araujo rammed into a law enforcement vehicle and refused to follow several verbal commands before an ICE officer shot and killed him last week in Houston. No video has been publicly released that shows the moment of that shooting.
There have been several instances of car crashes and rammings targeting immigration enforcement officers over the past year — incidents which may have factored into officers’ thinking in these recent, fatal cases — but ICE has also frequently used their own vehicles as a method of stopping and detaining immigrants and protesters.
Photos: Maine community reacts to shooting
People gathered Monday in Biddeford, Maine, after 26-year-old father Joan Sebastian Guerrero was fatally shot by an ICE officer.
Family of Maine shooting victim is "too scared to talk to anyone" following incident, resident says
Biddeford resident Isabel Paredes knew Joan Sebastian Guerrero, the victim of Monday’s fatal shooting, to be a dedicated, hardworking father who was happy and “wanted to be here to make a better future for his family,” she told CNN.
“Coming here is not easy, and working every single day for minimum wage is not easy,” Paredes said Tuesday morning.
Now, the slain 26-year-old’s family is frightened, even as aid groups have reached out with offers of food, money and legal help, she said.
“They’re too scared to talk to anyone,” Paredes said.
Witness: Maine shooting victim said, “I tried to stop”
Biddeford resident Daniel Boucher was in a home near where 26-year-old Joan Sebastian Guerrero was fatally shot by an ICE officer Monday morning, when he heard a “pop, pop, pop” sound.
Thinking he had heard fireworks, Boucher looked out from a third-floor window and saw a small car “turned 90 degrees to the curb” with an SUV behind it.
“The small car “started coming down the street again, driving, and I don’t know how, and then the SUV hit him again … And then that’s when he stopped,” Boucher told the Associated Press, adding that an ICE agent then opened the car door and pulled Guerrero out to the ground.
“His face was bloody, his head was bloody,” Boucher said.
“I clearly heard the victim say: ‘I tried to stop’,” Boucher added.
In two fatal ICE shootings, no body cameras were worn and few answers given
The federal agents who fatally shot two men during immigration operations in Maine and Houston within the span of a week were not wearing body cameras, an absence that has intensified calls for accountability.
In Biddeford, Maine, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed Joan Sebastian Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian man identified by a neighbor, on Monday during an operation, the Department of Homeland Security said.
Sen. Angus King, who has called for an investigation, said the agents had not been equipped with cameras. “We’ve been told that body cameras would be widely distributed,” he said, adding that DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin had told him the devices were “on order.”
The shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican national killed during a traffic stop in Houston last week, drew similar scrutiny. None of the officers involved wore a camera, and no video of the moment of the shooting has emerged.
The gap in key evidence has renewed long-standing calls for immigration officers to be equipped with cameras. A federal judge examining immigration enforcement tactics last year told a Border Patrol official that “cameras are your friends” that can capture threats officers may face.
Last week a DHS spokesperson blamed the lack of body cameras for the Houston officers on interruptions in agency funding caused by Democratic lawmakers. The spokesperson said cameras have reached “more than half the field offices,” with the rest to follow “in the next 60 days.” The department cited a more than 1,300% increase in assaults on its officers.
DHS did not immediately to respond to questions about whether the agents involved in the Maine shooting had been issued body cameras.
Key questions remain in the fatal shooting of a young Colombian father in Maine
The Department of Homeland Security says federal immigration agents were conducting a “targeted surveillance” operation when the driver of a vehicle was shot and killed in Biddeford, Maine on Monday.
But much of what unfolded between the driver, identified by a neighbor as 26-year-old Joan Sebastian Guerrero, and the federal officer who opened fire remains unclear.
- What made the officer fear for the public’s safety? DHS says the officer opened fire “fearing for public safety” after the car attempted to flee, but the agency hasn’t said what Guerrero may have done to create that fear.
- Is there video that shows what happened? Surveillance footage obtained by the Associated Press appears to show a car carrying Guerrero driving in slow circles at an intersection before another vehicle with federal agents drives up and brings the other car to a stop. Agents then approach the car with guns drawn, eventually pulling the driver out and laying his body on the ground. It’s unclear if the video depicts the actual shooting.
- Who was the target of the operation? DHS said agents were conducting surveillance on a home belonging to an “illegal alien” with a final order of removal during Monday’s operation. Maine Sen. Angus King’s office said Guerrero was “NOT the target of the warrant,” citing a conversation with DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. An immigrant rights group says the man killed had a social security number and was authorized to work in the US, though federal officials have not confirmed that.
- Who is the officer who opened fire? Officials have not identified the officer who fatally shot Guerrero. In a previous case, an ICE officer was only identified months after an incident, when he was charged with assault in the shooting of two Venezuelan immigrants in Minnesota.
Here’s the latest on the second fatal ICE shooting in less than a week
A 26-year-old Colombian man was shot and killed during a federal immigration enforcement operation in Maine Monday, less than one week after a Mexican immigrant died after an ICE agent opened fire into his van during a similar operation in Texas.
The days-apart fatal shootings by federal agents recall the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both of whom were killed amid the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement push in the Twin Cities region of Minnesota earlier this year.
Here’s what you need to know:
- “He was a good person”: The 26-year-old man killed Monday was identified as Joan Sebastian Guerrero by a neighbor, who told CNN Guerrero “worked hard to provide for his wife and a 3-year-old daughter.” The neighbor said he went outside after hearing gunshots and saw Guerrero on the ground by his car, his daughter nearby and his wife “screaming and crying next to him.”
- DHS account took hours: The Department of Homeland Security broke its nearly 12 hours of silence about the shooting Monday evening, saying ICE officers were “conducting targeted surveillance” of an “illegal alien” who attempted to flee. The markedly vague statement said an ICE officer fired his weapon “fearing for public safety” but didn’t provide details.
- Not the target: ICE was targeting “an illegal alien with a final order of removal,” according to DHS, but the man killed was “NOT the target of the warrant,” Maine Sen. Angus King’s office said after the lawmaker spoke with DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. The Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition said the young man who was killed was authorized to work in the US and had a social security number.
- Feds still keeping evidence in Houston: Last week’s fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo during an ICE traffic stop is under investigation, but local authorities launching their own probes say the federal government is not sharing evidence. Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare told CNN Monday his office has issued nearly 20 subpoenas looking to change that.
- Disturbing similarities: Like Guerrero, Salgado Araujo was also not the target of the ICE operation that resulted in his death. None of the federal agents involved in either of the past week’s fatal shootings were wearing body-mounted cameras. Salgado Araujo also leaves behind a grieving family, and both men’s killings have sparked protests and renewed outcry over the Trump administration’s aggressive tactics in the immigration crackdown.
"We can't have people killing people in our country like this," Biddeford mayor says
Like many Maine officials, Biddeford mayor Liam LaFountain has called for a thorough and transparent investigation into the fatal shooting of 26-year-old Joan Sebastian Guerrero at the hands of a federal agent.
“We can’t have people killing people in our country like this,” LaFountain said, adding that he hopes an investigation will “provide accountability” to Biddeford residents and families affected.
“We’re a country that needs immigration reform, but what we saw today, is not it … We’re a community that’s proud of our immigrant history in the 18th and 19th century. Immigrants in our city built this city and even today we welcome more and more immigrants from across the globe. And an incident like this, it’s really hard,” he added.
Vehicle stops are inherently dangerous for law enforcement. For ICE, they keep turning deadly
In law enforcement training programs coast to coast, officers are told that one of the most dangerous things they may ever do is stop the driver of another vehicle.
Recent deadly encounters involving ICE officers in Houston and Maine illustrate the point, with two men shot dead by immigration agents in less than a week during attempted traffic stops.
Vehicle stops can be inherently fraught and unpredictable, with the person behind the wheel in control of thousands of pounds of steel that can pose great risk should a driver refuse to comply or simply panic and flee.
This is why agencies like the FBI, ATF, and DEA rarely ever conduct car stops when taking a wanted person into custody, opting instead to surveil a subject and move in to make arrests when a person is ideally alone and on foot, providing officers greater control of the environment.
So why does ICE continue to use roving fleets of unmarked vehicles to pull over suspected undocumented immigrants, rather than surveil them until they are no longer behind the wheel?
One answer might lie in the quotas imposed by the Trump administration on the number of daily arrests they expect to occur.
Surveillance of a suspect can take hours or days, and is extremely resource-intensive.
By contrast, ICE traffic stops may be faster in achieving arrest numbers, but they also carry great risk to officers, suspects, and bystanders.
CNN review sheds light on fatal ICE-involved shooting in Maine
A CNN review of videos and photos offers new insight into the timeline of a fatal ICE-involved shooting in Biddeford, Maine, as key questions remain unanswered.
Man killed in Maine ICE shooting was a young father who worked hard, neighbor says
The man that was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Maine was identified as 26-year-old Joan Sebastian Guerrero, his neighbor, Nelson Elias, told CNN.
Elias came out of his house in Biddeford, Maine, Monday morning after being woken up around 7 a.m. by the sound of screams. He said he also heard officers ordering someone to park their car and then roughly half a dozen gunshots.
Guerrero, who was from Colombia, lived with his partner and daughter and worked as a delivery driver, Elias told CNN, noting he’d known his neighbor since 2024.
