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Narratives over the Minneapolis shooting of 37-year-old Alex Pretti clashed over the weekend as President Donald Trump’s administration accused him of violently resisting arrest, while his family remembered him as a “kind-hearted soul.”
Pretti, a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs ICU nurse, is the second person to be shot and killed in Minneapolis this month. Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem said the victim, who was armed, “violently resisted” arrest and that the federal agent fired his weapon “fearing for his life.”
Footage of the incident shows an agent disarmed Pretti shortly before he was killed. He entered into the initial scuffle with agents as he tried to assist another protester who had been pushed by law enforcement.
A federal judge soon blocked the Trump administration from “destroying or altering evidence” related to the shooting on Sunday.
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The ruling came after the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office and the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension filed a lawsuit Saturday to prevent the destruction of evidence in the case.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota, names DHS, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) and U.S. Border Control, as well as Attorney General Pam Bondi, as defendants.
In granting the temporary injunction, Judge Eric Tostrud wrote that federal officials and those acting on their behalf cannot destroy evidence taken from the scene of the south Minneapolis shooting or now in their exclusive custody, which state authorities say they were previously barred from inspecting.
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A hearing on the order has been scheduled for Monday.
Pretti’s parents, Michael and Susan Pretti, said Saturday that they are “heartbroken but also very angry,” and condemned the version of events presented by law enforcement as “sickening lies.”
“Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital,” the couple wrote.
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“The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He has his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down all while being pepper sprayed,” they continued.
Meanwhile, Trump highlighted that Pretti was armed and carrying two extra magazines at the time of the shooting. White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller went further than other members of the administration, calling Pretti a “would-be assassin” who “tried to murder federal law enforcement,” adding that he is a “domestic terrorist.”
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison had demanded a “a full, impartial, and transparent investigation” into the shooting.
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Ellison said he shares “intense grief and anger” over Pretti’s death and condemned ICE’s presence in Minnesota as an “illegal and unconstitutional occupation.”
Michael Sinkewicz contributed to this report.
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