A 26-year-old man, identified as Joan Sebastian Guerrero, was shot and killed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on Monday morning in Biddeford, Maine, the second fatal shooting in the nation in a week.
After the incident in Maine, now under investigation, residents gathered in the streets Monday night to protest the incident. The protests continued Tuesday.
Tuesday, the Trump Administration ordered ICE officers to cease “most” vehicle stops nationwide following two fatal incidents in the last week in which the victim was shot in their car, per The New York Times.
Department of Homeland Security issued a statement regarding the incident. ICE agents were reportedly monitoring a home early Monday morning that was the last known address of an illegal alien, per the statement.
“An illegal alien departed the residence in a vehicle. ICE law enforcement attempted to conduct a vehicle stop,” the post on X said. “The vehicle attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon. The driver of the vehicle was struck, and emergency services were immediately contacted. He passed away from his injuries.”
The incident remains under investigation.
Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, told CNN his office confirmed that the victim was not the target of the warrant. The Maine Immigrants Rights Coalition issued a press release Monday stating that the victim was a Colombian native who had been authorized to work in the U.S. and had been granted a Social Security number.
DHS did not explicitly confirm those details in its public statement.
The Associated Press and other media show video clips from nearby businesses of the incident, mostly showing a body being pulled from a car following the shooting.
Maine Gov. Janet Mills said that news of the victim being the wrong target “makes this tragedy even more disturbing and infuriating.”
“To those Maine people who are horrified by this tragedy, I am with you, and for those who choose to protest, I urge you to do so peacefully,” she said in a post on X.
Maine residents gathered in the streets on Monday to protest federal law enforcement.
Protesters were also recorded outside Republican Sen. Susan Collins’ office, calling for her to be ousted, yelling “vote her out.”
Collins said in a social media post that she had been in contact with DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin and requested that ICE stop conducting vehicle stops on illegal immigrants moving forward.
She also said the Boston office of the DHS Inspector General has taken over the investigation with the support of the FBI moving forward.
Second ICE shooting in less than a week
Monday’s shooting is the second ICE-related fatal shooting in the U.S. in less than a week. On July 7, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national who had been living in the U.S. for 35 years, was fatally shot by ICE agents in Houston, Texas.
Araujo was reportedly shot and killed after the vehicle he was driving was stopped by federal officials because they noticed “a white van with an individual who resembled the target” of an operation, per the BBC. Law enforcement officials said the vehicle Araujo was driving “rammed” an ICE vehicle and the agent fired in self-defense.
The van Araujo was driving was filled with other men on their way to a job site.
The incident is currently under federal investigation, though Araujo’s family is demanding that a separate, independent investigation be conducted.
“After nearly 35 years of working to give us the American dream, he made the choice to begin the process of obtaining his American dream through a work permit,” Araujo’s son Ronaldo Salgado said during a news conference last week. “We dotted every I, crossed every T, filled every document, attended every appointment. He was close to obtaining his legal status.”
“Had my father seen an emblem of ICE or an emblem that says anything about a law enforcement agency, my father would have complied,” he added.