A 26-year-old Colombian man legally residing in the U.S. was shot and killed by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deportation officer during an enforcement operation early Monday in Biddeford, a coastal Maine city, according to multiple state and federal officials. The incident has triggered immediate calls for a full, impartial probe, coming on the heels of a second controversial fatal ICE shooting that killed an unintended target in Texas just one week prior.
Ryan Fecteau, Speaker of the Maine House of Representatives, first confirmed the shooting via a Facebook post Monday morning, noting that Maine State Police and the state’s Department of Public Safety had secured the scene, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tapped to lead the independent investigation. Fecteau later updated his post to confirm the victim’s identity details: a 26-year-old Colombian national who was in the U.S. legally and held a valid Social Security number. Federal authorities have not officially released the deceased’s name to the public as of Monday.
Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey outlined the official preliminary account of the encounter in a Monday statement. According to Frey, the officer was carrying out enforcement actions tied to a final order of removal when the victim attempted to flee the scene by driving his vehicle directly toward the officer, prompting the fatal gunfire. Multiple local residents reported hearing at least four separate shots during the incident.
User-posted videos circulating on social media offer on-the-ground context of the aftermath. One clip captured a man clinging to the driver’s side window of a white sedan as the vehicle spun in place, while another footage shows ICE agents removing the victim’s body from the driver’s seat and surrounding the remains on the ground.
Maine’s top elected officials have all weighed in on the tragedy, calling for transparency to answer lingering questions. Governor Janet Mills confirmed she had received an official briefing on the incident, while U.S. Senator Susan Collins emphasized in a post on X that the shooting demanded a full and unbiased investigation. Biddeford Mayor Liam LaFountain said he was deeply shaken by the news, noting “situations like these are alarming and frightening.” “My thoughts are with the family and loved ones of the person who died as they face an unimaginable loss,” LaFountain said. “They deserve compassion, dignity and, in time, a full understanding of the circumstances that led to this tragedy.” He joined other leaders in calling for a complete, transparent investigation into the killing.
U.S. Senator Angus King told reporters at a noon news conference at Portland International Jetport that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials had confirmed to him the victim was a man in his 20s who had been served a final removal order, and that agency officials claimed the victim had “weaponized the vehicle” against the officer.
The Maine shooting comes as ICE has drastically scaled up immigration enforcement operations across the U.S. in recent weeks, with the agency increasingly targeting individuals not already held in law enforcement custody. It also follows a separate fatal shooting just seven days earlier in Houston, Texas, that has already stirred significant controversy.
In that July 7 incident, ICE agents fatally shot 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican father of three who had lived in Houston for 35 years and had no criminal record. Salgado Araujo was not the target of the ICE operation; he was driving to his construction job when agents in unmarked black vehicles pulled his van over. An official ICE statement claimed Salgado Araujo “refused to follow multiple verbal commands” and used his vehicle as a weapon to try to run over an agent, who then opened fire. But accounts from three passengers in the van, relayed by their attorney, contradict that narrative, saying Salgado Araujo never attempted to ram agents. Crucially, none of the responding ICE officers wore body cameras, leaving no definitive visual evidence to verify either account. Salgado Araujo’s son Ronaldo told local media his father was in the process of applying for legal permanent residency and was well-aware of how to interact with law enforcement during stops. U.S. Representative Al Green has formally called for a full investigation into the Houston killing.