Jul 15, 2026, 07:26Jul 15, 2026, 07:26
There has been another death in the context of operations by the controversial US migration agency ICE. One person fled on foot after encountering ICE officers in a gas station parking lot in the US state of Florida and subsequently died in a traffic accident, the Florida Highway Patrol said, citing initial findings.
An ICE officer in the USA. (symbol image) Image: keystone
The person who fled from the officers with three other occupants of a car on Tuesday morning was hit by a tractor-trailer on the street and fatally injured, it said. The accident occurred in the area of the city of St. Augustine, which is popular with tourists.
Ministry: Fatal victim had Mexican passport
In response to a dpa request, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said that the victim had a Mexican passport. There was talk of the use of law enforcement authorities. However, ICE was not mentioned by name.
According to the highway police, in addition to ICE, the HSI department of the Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for cross-border crimes, was also involved in the operation. The background remained unclear.
Two people have already died in connection with ICE incidents in the past few days. After an ICE officer shot an immigrant from Mexico during a check in Houston, Texas, a similar incident occurred in the northeastern state of Maine in which one person died. According to local civil rights organizations, the man killed was a 26-year-old man from Colombia who had a permit to work in the United States.
ICE operations are part of US President Donald Trump’s strict deportation policy. At the beginning of the year, the authority, which repeatedly used masked officers to carry out raids against migrants, came under heavy criticism. Federal officials shot and killed US citizens Renée Good and Alex Pretti in January. The move caused a nationwide outcry. The processing of the cases is also criticized. At the time, video recordings of the operations raised considerable doubts about the authorities’ representations. (dab/sda/dpa)