FBI Director Kash Patel personally ordered local prosecutors to cease investigating the death of Renee Good because he feared it would contradict President Donald Trump's version of the killing, a New York Times report claimed Saturday.
The order came from Patel and other senior officials who worried that pursuing a civil rights investigation — by using a warrant obtained on that basis — would contradict Trump’s claim that Good “violently, willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE Officer” who fired at her as she drove her vehicle.
The details were shared with the Times by several people with knowledge of the events who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
They said a senior federal prosecutor in Minnesota, Joseph H. Thompson, sought a warrant to search the Good's car for evidence. Thompson anticipated a standard civil rights investigation into agent Jonathan Ross's use of force.
In an email to colleagues, Thompson stated that the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, a state agency specializing in police shooting investigations, would work with the FBI to determine whether the shooting was justified and lawful.
But as the team, including FBI agents, prepared to document blood spatter and bullet holes with their signed warrant, they were ordered to halt operations.
Department of Justice officials proposed that, instead of looking at Ross, the investigators focus instead on the victim, the Times reported. They suggested prosecutors obtain a new warrant predicated on a criminal investigation into whether Ross had been assaulted by Good. Later, they urged prosecutors to investigate Good's partner instead, who had been present during the incident.
Career federal prosecutors in Minnesota, including Thompson, rejected these approaches, viewing them as legally questionable and inflammatory during a period of escalating public anger over federal immigration enforcement.
Thompson and five others resigned in protest, triggering a broader exodus that severely depleted Minnesota's U.S. attorney's office, the Times reported.
From an office of approximately 25 criminal litigators, the departures removed top prosecutors overseeing investigations into fraud in Minnesota's social services programs—investigations the White House previously cited as justification for the immigration crackdown.
The Times' account derives from interviews with approximately a dozen individuals in Minnesota and Washington, D.C.
F.B.I. spokeswoman Cindy Burnham and U.S. Attorney Daniel N. Rosen declined to comment to the Times. Department of Justice spokeswoman Emily Covington did not respond to requests for comment.