Ex-federal Prosecutor: Minneapolis Shooting Is Not Even a Close Call

“Passion governs, and she never governs wisely,” noted Benjamin Franklin in 1775. This could come to mind with the response to the fatal Minneapolis shooting of activist Renee Nicole Good by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). After all, far from being icy, as in cool-headed, many are running on fiery emotion and coming to risible conclusions.

But one man rising above the passion, and marshaling the facts, is ex-federal prosecutor Bill Shipley. And Shipley, who spent 22-plus years in his federal role, has drawn a definitive conclusion on the shooting.

It was absolutely just, he says — in fact, it’s “not even a close call.”

Bringing the Receipts

Writing at Substack Saturday, Shipley first addresses a common but callow misconception. He states that

the claim floating around social media that ICE officers have no jurisdiction over U.S. citizens is simply wrong. They are law enforcement officers with the authority to detain citizens briefly as part of their investigatory powers, and to arrest citizens who conspire to obstruct and/or do actually obstruct their lawful operations.

This is just common sense. After all, would it be reasonable creating a standard that makes federal agents powerless against citizens who’d obstruct their duties?

Shipley, though, leaves no doubt. He cites Title 18 U.S.C. Sec. 111, a federal criminal statute involving interference with federal law enforcement. I won’t provide chapter and verse here because of space constraints. (But you can read Shipley’s exhaustive article for all the details.) Among other things, however, he points out that the statute’s subsection (a)(1)

makes it a federal crime: assault, resist, oppose, impede, intimidate, or interfere with such employees while they are engaged in or on account of their performance of their official duties.

The penalties for violating the above, the ex-prosecutor explains, range from one to 20 years, depending on the trespass’ severity.

Already Had Its Day in Court

Shipley’s essay reads a bit like a legal brief and includes court cases and rulings vindicating his assertions. For instance, citing the Eighth Circuit’s United States v. Wallace decision in 2017, he informs:

The point is that Renee Good committed an aggravated felony against the ICE Officer before he drew his weapon and fired his first shot.

IT DOES NOT MATTER WHETHER SHE ACTUALLY STRUCK HIM WITH HER VEHICLE.

…[Rather], the assault is complete “if the defendant’s conduct places the officer in fear for his life or safety…”

Of course, whether Good struck the ICE agent, identified as Jonathan Ross, has become a bone of contention. Interestingly, though, even hard-left Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey tacitly admitted that she did during a Friday press briefing. Only, the Democrat dismissed Ross’ consequent injury as something you might get from a “refrigerator door.”

Shipley also mentions Graham v. Connor, a 9-0 1989 decision. He writes that he does not believe Ross erred in the force he used against Good. Nonetheless, he points out, citing Graham, “The law on excessive force — even use of deadly force — tolerates mistakes.” Explanation?

Reasonableness is judged from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, not with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight.

A Series of Tragic — and Bad — Decisions

After citing yet more Supreme Court reasoning and explanations, Shipley outlined the series of bad and deadly decisions Good made:

The totality of circumstances relevant to the ICE Officer’s decision to use deadly force would have included … that she had created a dangerous condition for others in parking her vehicle blocking a lane of traffic, had failed to comply with lawful commands to exit her vehicle, failed to heed lawful commands to stop as she put the vehicle in gear and began to move, the directions coming from her partner to “drive” while the Officer was in front of her vehicle, his observations of her and her conduct through the front windshield, her turning the wheel into his direction and bringing the front end around to face him directly, and then beginning to accelerate with the car in “Drive.”

….When she braked, stopped, shifted into Drive, and hit the accelerator, he REACTED immediately by removing his weapon — something he had not done to that point because he did not perceive a risk until she did that.

This said, I certainly can see how some might wonder, in hindsight, if Ross had to fire on the woman. But here’s the point: Even if it was a gray area situation, the law-enforcement officer must be given the benefit of the doubt.

Moreover, it’s much as when President Donald Trump was shot in Butler, Pennsylvania. One-third inch difference in bullet placement could’ve meant his death. Likewise, gunning a two-ton vehicle surrounded by people is a deadly and dangerous game. An inch the wrong way could’ve meant Agent Ross suffering serious injury or even death.

The Bigger Issue

Then, there’s a larger matter: Who set the stage for this?

Irresponsible “leaders” did. It’s as with the tacit, wink-and-nod Democrat-politician approval of the 600-plus 2020 left-wing riots. Office holders such as Governor Tim Walz (D-Minn.), Mayor Frey, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) have demonized ICE. They’ve essentially demeaned the agency as illegitimate and its agents as interlopers in American cities. They’ve behaved as if immigration law is unjust and tyrannical. What did anyone expect the result to be?

Answer: what it has always been. As to this, too, then-governor Ronald Reagan (R-Calif.) encapsulated the problem well while addressing Berkeley academics in 1969. Alluding to unrest in which students rioted and an innocent bystander was accidentally killed by police, he stated:

Once the dogs of war are unleashed, you must expect that things will happen and that people, being human, will make mistakes on both sides.

This isn’t to imply that Agent Ross made a mistake. It’s only to say that even if he had, those enabling the violence would bear culpability.

Then, Reagan said something else that absolutely applies today, albeit to older people as well. Scolding the Berkeley professors and/or administrators, he said of the violence (videos below):

All of it began the first time some of you — who know better and are old enough to know better — let young people think that they had the right to choose the laws they would obey, as long as they were doing it in the name of social protest.

Of course, there’s one big difference today: We have lots of people “old enough” but fewer who actually know better.