Judge allows release of bodycam footage, texts in Chicago shooting by Border Patrol agent

By Renee Hickman

CHICAGO, Feb 6 (Reuters) – A federal judge has allowed the release of bodycam footage, text messages and other evidence in the case of a Chicago woman who was shot multiple times by a Border Patrol agent during an immigration enforcement operation last fall.

District Judge Georgia N. Alexakis granted the request from Marimar Martinez, a U.S. citizen and Montessori school teacher who was shot while protesting against the Trump administration’s surge of immigration agents to the city in October. 

The judge issued a decision on Friday lifting the order that blocked the public release of body camera footage and other evidence in the case.

Martinez, 31, was accused by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security of ramming an agent’s car and boxing it in with her own vehicle.

She was initially indicted on federal charges of impeding a federal officer. But the U.S. attorney’s office dropped the charges after evidence was released in court that the Border Patrol agent, Charles Exum, had driven his vehicle back to his base in Maine before the defense had a chance to inspect it, and boasted about the shooting in text messages.For months, Martinez has said that bodycam footage contradicts the government’s account of the incident.

Martinez had asked for the evidence to be released, in part, because the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has not changed a statement released shortly after the shooting that labeled her and another protester as “domestic terrorists.”

EVIDENCE OFTEN AT ODDS WITH ADMINISTRATION’S NARRATIVE

The statement echoed others released by DHS following violent encounters involving federal agents – including the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by immigration agents in Minnesota in January – that portrayed the people shot as aggressors and defended the agents’ use of lethal force. 

But a Reuters review of such incidents shows that video and other evidence has repeatedly contradicted that narrative, raising doubts about the government’s version of events.

The Trump administration has stressed the need for agents’ safety as they carry out an immigration crackdown and DHS has said it aims to “give swift, accurate information to the American people.”

The Martinez case is among 17 criminal cases in Chicago that the government has brought against protesters and subsequently dropped, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Chicago said on Friday.

Martinez’s lawyer, Christopher Parente, has said bodycam footage from a Border Patrol agent recorded during the incident shows the driver of the Border Patrol vehicle turning the steering wheel to the left, toward Martinez’s vehicle. After the vehicles made contact, the agents stepped out and one of them fired at Martinez.

Martinez asked the court to release the footage and additional evidence in her case after the fatal shootings in Minnesota. Parente said the evidence – including new text messages and emails from DHS officials and others – could be released as soon as Monday. 

Martinez, who was in court on Friday, testified at a public forum organized by congressional Democrats in Washington earlier this week that she was grateful that she had survived the “attempted murder.”

In a November hearing in the case, text messages from Exum to other agents bragging about the shooting were shown, including one that read in part, “I fired 5 rounds and she had 7 holes. Put that in your book boys.”

The judge also ordered the release of Flock camera images, which capture vehicle information. 

Alexakis said the images, which she has not seen, could show Martinez engaged in “run-of-the-mill” activities in the days preceding the shooting, which could dispel the DHS narrative that she was a domestic terrorist.

(Reporting by Renee Hickman, Editing by Emily Schmall and Deepa Babington)