Minnesota officials filed a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration seeking court-ordered access to evidence they say they need to conduct independent investigations into three shootings by federal officers, including the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, according to the Associated Press.
In its complaint filed Tuesday, Minnesota alleges the federal government reneged on a promise to cooperate with state investigations after a surge of federal law enforcement in Minneapolis, and state officials asked a judge to compel compliance, the AP reported.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, speaking to reporters after the suit was announced, said she was prepared to press for transparency and accountability, citing what she said was the federal government’s refusal to share evidence. She said, “We are prepared to fight for transparency and accountability that the federal government is desperate to avoid.”
The lawsuit’s demand for evidence centers on the two fatal shootings. The AP reported that the Justice Department in January said it was opening a federal civil rights investigation into Pretti’s killing, while it had said a similar federal probe was not warranted in the killing of Good, a decision the AP described as a departure from how past administrations handled such shootings.
The AP also reported that Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Civil Rights Division does not investigate every law enforcement shooting and that there must be circumstances and facts that “warrant an investigation.” In a separate account provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the department said Customs and Border Protection was conducting an internal investigation into Pretti’s case.
For Good, DHS said in an email response that the matter remained under investigation and that footage showed Good “impeded law enforcement operations and weaponized her vehicle,” leading an officer to act in self-defense, according to the AP.
Minnesota’s lawsuit further asks for access to evidence in a third case, the January shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis that left him wounded in his right thigh, the AP reported. Federal officials initially accused Sosa-Celis and another man of beating an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer with a broom handle and a snow shovel, but federal prosecutors later dropped charges, and authorities opened a criminal investigation into whether two immigration officers lied under oath about the shooting.
On Tuesday, DHS said both officers were on administrative leave as ICE and the Justice Department conduct a joint review, while also saying ICE was committed to transparency and accountability, the AP reported.
The suit also frames the dispute as one about federal cooperation with state investigations of potential violations of criminal laws within Minnesota’s borders. The lawsuit said the federal government is not permitted to “withhold investigative evidence for the purpose of shielding law enforcement officers from scrutiny where a State is investigating serious potential violations of its criminal laws, targeting its citizens, within its borders,” the AP reported.
Moriarty said the lawsuit followed formal demands for evidence after the federal government blocked Minnesota investigators from accessing evidence related to the shootings, and she called the practice unprecedented and alarming. She said the federal government “has adopted a policy of categorically withholding evidence,” according to the AP.
The lawsuit comes amid broader fallout from an immigration enforcement operation in the Twin Cities area, the AP reported. It described that Democrats in Congress were holding up funding as part of efforts to secure restraints on the Trump administration’s immigration agenda, and said there had also been developments including a Homeland Security shutdown.
Rachel Moran, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, said that cases by states against the federal government are highly unusual. She told the AP that local agencies do not often try to investigate potential crimes by federal officers, and that the federal government rarely refuses to cooperate; she added that the “state should have a chance at success” because Minnesota’s basic claim is that it has a right to review evidence involving a possible crime in its jurisdiction.
The AP reported that Moran also said an outcome in either direction could affect the balance of federal and state power: if a judge grants the state’s request, she said it could support state and local officials’ ability to investigate federal officers, while if the federal government is allowed to withhold evidence, it could discourage cooperation between federal and state agencies.