On Saturday, Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse and U.S. citizen, was shot and killed by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis. There’s a wide gap between what Americans have seen of the shooting and what federal officials are telling them.
Soon after the shooting, Department of Homeland Security officials rushed to defend the officers involved, claiming the victim “approached U.S. Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun” and that when federal agents attempted to disarm him, “the suspect violently resisted.”
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem defended the Border Patrol agent who shot Pretti, saying in a news conference that the agent fired “defensive” shots after the victim violently brandished a gun. “The officers attempted to disarm this individual, but the armed suspect reacted violently,” Noem said.
In a separate press conference, Border Patrol commander-at-large Greg Bovino claimed Pretti may have wanted to do “maximum damage” and “massacre law enforcement.”
But videos taken by bystanders, filmed from several different angles, tell a different story.
In the first video verified by CNBC, protestors can be heard honking their horns on an urban Minneapolis street, while the video’s author records through a car windshield as the car moves.
At 15 seconds, the camera pans to the left to show a man on the side of the street wearing a brown jacket and tan pants (believed to be Alex Pretti) holding up what appears to be a phone while being confronted by two federal agents.
Pretti steps backwards away from the confrontation while appearing to yell at an agent.
At 21 seconds, the person filming the video drives past the confrontation, and the camera swings to the other side of the street as someone in the car yells profanities.
In a second video verified by CNBC, protestors can be heard blowing whistles and honking their horns at federal agents in a video on a cold Minneapolis street.
At seven seconds, the video shows a man dressed in tactical gear believed to be a federal agent shove a woman wearing a brown jacket and black leggings in the back near the side of the street. She doesn’t fall but moves several feet away because of the shove.
The camera briefly shifts to the middle of the street before going back to the confrontation on the side at 11 seconds. The agent is face-to-face with one woman wearing a long cream jacket and charcoal pants. Next to her is a man in a brown jacket and tan pants believed to be Pretti, and next to him is the woman in brown jacket, black leggings who was shoved seconds ago.
At 12 seconds in the second video, the agent shoves the woman wearing the cream jacket to the ground. Pretti puts himself between the agent and the woman, who is on her back in a snowbank on the side of the road.
At 14 seconds, the agent starts spraying Pretti in the face with a chemical agent. Pretti covers his face and turns away from the officer. Other agents wearing vests approach the confrontation.
At 22 seconds, several agents are struggling with Pretti, attempting to bring him to the ground. He appears to fall to the ground, and at 28 seconds you see one agent apparently swinging a punch at his head while Pretti is down.
At this point, bystanders are recording, and whistles are making noise constantly.
By 38 seconds, at least six agents seem to have restrained the man believed to be Pretti on the ground.
One agent appears to take a weapon from Pretti and quickly walks away while holding the gun. A gunshot is heard at 40 seconds. It is unclear if the man holding the gun fired the shot. Following the first shot, more gunshots are heard in quick succession.
In a third video verified by CNBC, taken by someone on the street near the incident, protestors are blowing whistles at federal agents.
At 25 seconds, a man wearing a brown jacket and tan pants believed to be Pretti is holding his hand up in the middle of the street. He waves a car past and then starts walking. The camera then shifts away for a moment to a snowbank. A protestor can be heard shouting, “What is wrong with you?”
At 33 seconds into the third video, Pretti has his arm around a woman in a dark green jacket and black leggings, apparently attempting to help her. He steps in front of a federal agent closing in on a woman who is on her back in the snowbank on the side of the road.
At 40 seconds, Pretti has his hand up to a federal agent who is spraying him with some kind of chemical agent. Two agents drag him onto his back and more agents join in a circle around the man in tan pants. A struggle takes place on the ground, with six agents surrounding the man in tan pants.
At 60 seconds, one of the agents can be seen stepping back from the confrontation and he draws his gun and points it at Pretti.
At 1:01, a single shot can be heard, followed by several in quick succession. The man on the ground, Pretti, slumps down.
Amid screams, at 1:04, another flurry of gunshots can be heard.
At no point in any of the three videos shown here does Alex Pretti brandish a weapon or appear to threaten federal immigration agents before the confrontation begins, as was claimed by DHS Sec. Noem and others in the Trump administration.
One video also appears to show a federal officer removing a weapon from Pretti while he’s being restrained by agents on the ground before any shots are fired.
Pretti is a lawful gun owner and owns a permit for his weapon.