Over the weekend, differing accounts emerged regarding the shooting of 37-year-old Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. While President Donald Trump’s administration claimed he resisted arrest with force, Pretti’s family described him as a “kind-hearted soul.”

Pretti, who worked as an ICU nurse at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, became the second anti-ICE protester to be fatally shot in Minneapolis this month. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem stated that Pretti was armed and “violently resisted” arrest, prompting an ICE agent to discharge his weapon in self-defense.

Video footage of the incident reveals that an ICE agent disarmed Pretti shortly before the fatal shooting. The confrontation began when Pretti intervened to help another protester who had been pushed by law enforcement officers.

In response to the incident, a federal judge issued an order on Sunday preventing the Trump administration from “destroying or altering evidence” related to the shooting.

An undated photograph provided by Michael Pretti shows Alex J. Pretti, the individual shot by a federal officer in Minneapolis on Saturday, January 24, 2026. (Michael Pretti via AP)

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.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks beside a screen showing an image of a handgun during a press conference in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 24, 2026. (Nathan Howard/Reuters)

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.

A screengrab from a video shows a law enforcement officer spraying irritants at Alex Pretti before he was fatally shot by federal agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Jan. 24, 2026. (Reuters)

“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.

A federal agent fires a munition toward demonstrators near the site where Alex Pretti was fatally shot in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Jan. 24, 2026. (Tim Evans/Reuters)

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.”

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