A person was killed in a shooting involving Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Monday in Biddeford, Maine, according to the Maine Speaker of the House, Ryan Fecteau, D-Maine.
Fecteau, a Biddeford native, posted on Monday morning that “This morning a shooting occurred in Biddeford. A person was killed. ICE was involved.”
In the post, Fecteau said that state police were on the scene alongside the state Department of Public Safety. He also said he expected an FBI investigation into the incident.
In a report, The Maine Wire confirmed that an intersection was closed off and investigators were present at an active crime scene on Pool St. in Biddeford, and that police were asking the press to assemble at a local school, pending updates.
The Portland Press Herald reports that the man who was killed was from Colombia and authorized to work in the U.S. According to the Maine Attorney General’s office, the man was shot while attempting “to flee in a vehicle in the direction of the officer.”
Biddeford Mayor Liam LaFountain said in a statement Monday that “there is strong cooperation among local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies as the circumstances surrounding the use of deadly force are investigated.”
Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, said Monday that she was in contact with ICE officials concerning this morning’s shooting but has “learned very little,” other than the fact that ICE officers were not wearing body cameras during the shooting.
Neither ICE nor Fecteau’s office immediately responded to a request for comment.
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The shooting in Maine comes just a week after the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by an ICE officer in Texas, with the Washington Post reporting that witnesses have challenged the government’s claim that Salgado Araujo has attempted to ram an officer with his car.
The string of shootings comes months after a spate of violence from ICE officers shocked the country in January, most notably in the so-called “Operation Metro Surge” in Minneapolis, which saw ICE officers kill two Minneapolis residents, Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, and maim a third, Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis.
