A witness to the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis says the chaos didn’t end when the gunfire stopped — and that people who tried to help were kept back as agents drew their weapons.
Venus DeMars describes the scene as tense and overwhelming, with what she called a heavy, military-style presence, roughly two dozen ICE vehicles, and rising anger among onlookers on Wednesday, Jan. 7.
“People were just incensed that ICE had kept assistance away from her using weapons,” she says. “So there was a lot of people who were there that tried to run over to help her, that were venting that frustration directly at the ICE agents who were getting out of their car.”
DeMars says she arrived while EMTs were performing CPR on Good, and that it took about 15 minutes for an ambulance to make its way through the crowd.
“I could tell that she hadn’t made it,” DeMars says. “You know, [when] somebody is shot, you would use bandages, you’d be trying to stop the bleeding. You wouldn’t be doing CPR on somebody. And then after a minute, and then when the ambulance drives away quietly without a siren, I knew she was gone.”
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(749x0:751x2):format(webp)/Renee-Nicole-Good-010826-4-f1606285b96845d0ab9f90f5ca286db1.jpg)
Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, was shot by an agent after a group of people allegedly began blocking officials during an immigration enforcement operation in the city.
The Department of Homeland Security accused Good of “weaponiz[ing] her vehicle” in an “act of domestic terrorism,” per a post on X. Minnesota officials have disputed that characterization, with Minneapolis’ mayor calling it “bulls—.”
The agent who fatally shot Good has been identified as Jonathan Ross, the Minnesota Star Tribune first reported. It’s not clear whether he is facing criminal charges at this time. An investigation is ongoing.
At a news conference on Thursday, Jan. 8, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the agent was treated at a hospital and released. Bystander videos reportedly show the officer walking around after the shooting before getting into a car and leaving the scene.
