ICE suspends traffic stops after fatal shooting in Maine

PHOTO CAPTION: Illustrative file photo — Masked law enforcement officers, including HSI and ICE agents, walk into an immigration court in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S., May 21, 2025. (REUTERS/Caitlin O'Hara)

By Aleksandra Michalska  and Kristina Cooke (Reuters)

BIDDEFORD, Maine  -  U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Tuesday suspended vehicle stops related to immigration enforcement, two sources briefed on the matter said, after agents fatally shot two men six days apart during stops in Texas and Maine.

The policy shift came one day after an ICE officer killed a driver in the coastal Maine town of Biddeford, about 15 miles (24 km) south of Portland.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security released a statement nearly 12 hours after the shooting asserting that the officer, "fearing for public safety," opened fire when the driver attempted to flee agents trying to pull him over.

Officials did not explain how the driver might have posed a threat to the public or whether that would justify the use of deadly force. According to ICE policy, officers may use deadly force only when there is "imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death to the officer or to another person" and is not authorized "solely to prevent the escape of a fleeing suspect."

While some video footage of the incident's aftermath has emerged, there is not yet any public video showing the moment of the shooting itself. U.S. Senator Angus King, an independent from Maine who caucuses with the Democrats, told reporters that the agents involved were not wearing body cameras, leaving questions unanswered about the circumstances surrounding the shooting.

DHS, the parent agency of ICE, said that the agents were surveilling the last known address of someone with a final order of removal from the country. When someone departed the residence, the officers followed the car, the agency said.

DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin told King that the man killed was not the target of the operation, according to a spokesperson for the senator.

Immigration advocates said the person shot was a 26-year-old Colombian man who was authorized to work in the U.S. The shooting sparked immediate protests on Monday, and further demonstrations were scheduled for Tuesday. 

Since the beginning of June, ICE arrests in Maine have more than quadrupled to around 70 per day in early July, according to internal ICE data shared with Reuters by a source.

Monday's killing, along with another last week in Houston, brought to at least seven the number of people shot dead during immigration enforcement operations since January 2025, when President Donald Trump returned to office and launched a campaign of mass deportations.

Asked about the suspension of traffic stops, an ICE spokesperson said, "We are always evaluating our procedures to keep our officers safe and criminals off our streets. We will not disclose or discuss law enforcement tactics."

'I TRIED TO STOP'

One witness, Daniel Boucher, 71, a caregiver and part-time draftsman who lives in downtown Biddeford, told Reuters he was on the second floor of his apartment when he heard what sounded like firecrackers on Monday morning.

He rushed to the window and saw a white SUV ram a smaller white car. After running down to street level, and from a vantage point just 20 feet (6 meters) away, Boucher saw an ICE officer emerge from the SUV, open the car's door and pull out the driver, who had blood on his face and head.

"I remember hearing the victim say, 'But I tried to stop,'" Boucher said, before the man appeared to stop breathing.

In a video clip verified by Reuters, the white car appears to meander directionless as two men wearing vests on foot try to stop it, but it was unclear whether the footage was recorded before or after the shooting.

The Maine attorney general's office said it was investigating the shooting alongside local, state and federal authorities.

HOUSTON SHOOTING

The shooting came six days after an ICE agent in Houston's heavily Hispanic East End fatally shot a 52-year-old man, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, after a traffic stop during an immigration enforcement operation. Salgado was not the target of the operation, a DHS official has said.

ICE said in a statement that Salgado, a Mexican national living in the U.S. illegally for over three decades, rammed a law enforcement vehicle with his van and attempted to run down an officer who fired in self-defense.

The agency offered no evidence to support its account. In similar instances over the past year, initial ICE and DHS statements about the use of force have been contradicted by video footage or other evidence, sometimes in court.

Three men who were riding in Salgado's van have disputed ICE's narrative of the incident, according to a lawyer for two of the men.

Arrests of immigrants have surged in recent weeks, even as the Trump administration has moved away from broad sweeps in Democratic-led cities as part of its crackdown. Those operations were widely criticized as violent and heavy-handed after two U.S. citizens were killed in January by federal agents in Minnesota.

(Reporting by Aleksandra Michalska in Biddeford, Maine, and Kristina Cooke in San Francisco; Additional reporting by Helen Coster; Writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Paul Thomasch, Alistair Bell and Mark Porter // REUTERS)