ICE pauses most vehicle stops after fatal shootings in Maine and Texas
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U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has temporarily halted routine vehicle stops nationwide, limiting them to serious criminal targets while additional training is provided, following two deadly incidents in Maine and Texas.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have been directed to suspend most vehicle stops in enforcement operations across the country, except when a serious criminal target is involved, after two fatal shootings in Texas and Maine last week. The pause is temporary and will remain in effect while ICE conducts additional training on vehicle-stop tactics, law-enforcement sources said.
In Maine, 26-year-old Colombian national Joan Sebastian Guerrero, who was in the country illegally, was shot when he tried to flee a vehicle stop in Biddeford on Monday morning. DHS said officers were conducting targeted surveillance on a different individual’s address and attempted to pull over Guerrero’s car. Guerrero was not the operation’s target.
Senator Angus King, an independent from Maine, called for an independent investigation, stating, > "I want a full, fair, open, transparent investigation of this, not strictly run by the feds."
Republican Senator Susan Collins said she urged DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin to halt non-urgent vehicle stops, noting that the Biddeford shooting raises critical questions.
A similar incident occurred in Houston six days earlier when ICE officers shot Mexican national Lorenzo Salgado Araujo while stopping his vehicle during a search for another person. DHS said officers acted after a credible tip and observed a vehicle resembling the target, and that Araujo ignored verbal commands and attempted to ram an officer.
Araujo’s family says he had no criminal record and was close to obtaining a work permit after living in the United States for more than three decades.
King criticized the broader immigration enforcement approach, saying it has often resulted in arrests of individuals without criminal records.