Six federal prosecutors in Minnesota have resigned over a dispute regarding the Justice Department’s handling of the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good.
Good, 37, was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross in Minneapolis last Wednesday as she attempted to drive away from an alleged protest after being confronted by agents.
Joseph H. Thompson, the second-ranking official at the U.S. attorney’s office, has now stepped down after internally expressing concerns about the handling of the case.
Highlights
- Six federal prosecutors in Minnesota resigned over disagreements on the DOJ's handling of Renee Good’s fatal shooting case by an ICE agent.
- Joseph H. Thompson resigned after opposing a criminal probe into Renee Good’s widow and the exclusion of local investigators from the case.
- Four DOJ Civil Rights Division leaders also resigned in protest over refusal to investigate whether the ICE agent’s use of force was justified.
Joseph H. Thompson was among those to resign in protest
Image credits: Leila Navidi/The Minnesota Star Tribune via Getty Images
According to the New York Times, Thompson, 47, handed in his resignation after DOJ officials pushed for a criminal investigation into Good’s widow, Becca Good.
Thompson, who was the lead prosecutor in the Feeding Our Future fraud case, disagreed with investigating Good’s widow and the decision to freeze out local investigators.
He reportedly wanted the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) to be involved in investigations, but was overruled by senior officials, the NYT reported.
The BCA said in a statement last week that it had reluctantly withdrawn from the case after initially being assigned to investigate Good’s killing, confirming the FBI would take over.
Among the other career prosecutors who resigned were Harry Jacobs, Melinda Williams, and Thomas Calhoun-Lopez.
Image credits: ODU English Department
Sources told the NYT that reluctance from authorities to investigate the shooter's actions had also contributed to their decision to quit.
“It has been an honor and a privilege to represent the United States and this office,” Thompson wrote in his resignation email, obtained by the Minnesota Star Tribune.
Thompson did not detail a reason for his abrupt resignation, and none of the resigning prosecutors have commented publicly.
Governor Tim Walz directly linked the decision to the Trump administration, writing in a post on X, “Joe is a principled public servant who spent more than a decade achieving justice for Minnesotans. This is a huge loss for our state.
“It’s also the latest sign Trump is pushing nonpartisan career professionals out of the justice department, replacing them with his sycophants.”
The DOJ is not investigating whether the actions of the ICE agent were justified
Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara also expressed his dismay at Thompson’s resignation in a statement to local media.
“The legitimacy of the justice system depends on institutions — not rhetoric. Joe Thompson is an institution within law enforcement,” O'Hara said.
“When you lose the leader responsible for making the fraud cases, it tells you this [immigration enforcement] isn't really about prosecuting fraud.”
It comes after at least four leaders of the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division, a DOJ unit that investigates police killings, resigned in protest on Monday over the case, MS Now reported.
Their decision related to the department refusing to open an investigation into Ross that would have assessed whether his use of deadly force was justified.
Image credits: maxnesterak/X
A Justice Department official told MS Now that the four leaders had requested early retirement before Good’s shooting.
The DOJ has instead decided to focus on Good’s wife and protest groups that had been tracking and monitoring ICE activity in the weeks leading up to the incident.
Good was reportedly part of a citywide network documenting and resisting the agency and was reportedly given specialized training after joining a group called ICE Watch.
Across the U.S., similar ‘ICE watch’ or rapid-response networks operate in dozens of cities, with the shared goal of monitoring and documenting ICE activities.