Daniel Boucher was getting ready for work Monday morning when he heard what he first thought were fireworks. He rushed to his window. Below, in the intersection of Hill and Pool streets in downtown Biddeford, Maine, federal agents in vests had stopped a white sedan and pulled the driver out.

“His face was bloody. His head was bloody,” Boucher told the Associated Press. “I clearly heard the victim say, ‘I tried to stop.’”

Boucher watched the man’s legs stop moving as he lay in the street. He believes he watched him die.

Down the block, a neighbor named Mary Hayes watched from outside. She told the AP what she saw after the shooting: a woman falling to her knees next to a body on the ground, and a little girl standing nearby in tears. “I watched a little girl crying with a little pink backpack on,” Hayes said. “She’s never going to see her father again.”

The man who died was 26 years old, a native of Colombia who had come to Maine to live and work, according to a joint statement from the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition and Presente! Maine. The organizations said he was authorized to work in the United States and had been issued a Social Security number. However, TIME and the AP report that they hadn’t independently verified this information. At the time of writing this piece, his name had not been released.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed him. It is at least the ninth time a person has died in an encounter with federal immigration officials since President Donald Trump began his second-term immigration crackdown, according to the AP. The previous one happened six days ago, when agents killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, 52, in Houston.

What Happened in Biddeford

Biddeford is a coastal city of about 23,000 people, roughly 15 miles southwest of Portland. Just after 7 a.m. Monday, ICE agents in an unmarked vehicle pursued the man’s white sedan through a downtown intersection. Witnesses said an SUV attempted to ram the smaller car before agents stopped it and pulled the driver out.

Em Akerley, who lives in a second-floor apartment near the intersection, heard the first gunshot around 7:15 a.m., followed by about seven more, she told the Portland Press Herald. She looked out her window as the car circled the intersection, as if the driver had lost control, with agents pressing against the driver’s side door. Then, more agents came running from down the street.

After officers pulled the man from the car, no one approached him. “No one went to him, and no one did anything,” Akerley said.

Boucher said the agent he believed had fired the shots walked past him when he went to his front door.

“I said, ‘This was awful,’” Boucher told the AP. “He looked at me and said, ‘He tried to run me over.’”

The man’s body lay uncovered in the street until emergency responders arrived. “I wouldn’t want anyone to see what I witnessed,” Boucher said. “He was saying he was trying to stop, and then he died. Why? Because he was driving a car?”

ICE’s Account, and What We Know

Sen. Angus King, Independent of Maine, said he spoke directly with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin after the shooting. Mullin told King ICE agents ordered the man to leave the country and had “weaponized the vehicle” against the pursuing officers, per AP.

The Maine attorney general’s office, which is investigating alongside the FBI, said initial statements suggest the motorist was fleeing in the direction of the agent when they opened fire. The agent responsible has been placed on administrative leave.

DHS provided accounts justifying each shooting that witnesses and evidence later disputed. Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, six days ago. Renee Good, shot in Minneapolis in January 2026. Alex Pretti, also killed in Minneapolis that month, per Reuters, “despite video evidence to the contrary.” Similarly, agents shot Chicago-area resident Marimar Martinez five times in October, and she survived; charges against her were eventually dropped, and bodycam footage contradicted the DHS account.

The Colombian Embassy said it is in contact with U.S. authorities and working to confirm the individual’s identity and nationality, per AP.

No Body Cameras, Again

King confirmed that the agents in Biddeford were not wearing body cameras. Former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem announced the deployment of body cameras in February 2026, following the killings of Pretti and Good in Minneapolis.

Mullin told King the cameras “have been distributed widely across the country, but not everywhere, and apparently not in Biddeford,” per USA Today.

The agents who killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston six days ago were also not wearing body cameras.

People Are Still Demanding Answers

Dozens of protesters gathered near the scene in Biddeford within hours of the shooting, holding signs reading “Leave Biddo” and “ICE Out of Our Neighborhoods.”

Rep. Chellie Pingree, a Democrat from Maine, posted a video on social media with a series of questions. “Were they pursuing someone with a criminal record? Was this a random traffic stop? How did this possibly happen, and why was this person shot? Were the officers wearing body cameras?” She added: “More than anything else, I want to know: why are you in Maine?”

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows said on X: “It’s time to get ICE off our streets.”

The Numbers Continue To Rise

The Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition said its hotline calls about ICE sightings and detentions had already risen 35% in May and June compared to April, per TIME. ICE arrested 546 people in Maine between the start of Trump’s second term and March 11, 2026, according to ICE arrest data provided to the University of California, Berkeley Deportation Data Project and analyzed by the AP. About 45% had criminal backgrounds. During the equivalent period before Trump took office, roughly 69% of those arrested had criminal backgrounds.

The enforcement surge that hit Maine in January carried a name DHS apparently found clever. They called it “Operation Catch of the Day,” a reference to Maine’s seafood industry, per AP. Of the approximately 200 people arrested during that operation, only 11 had a criminal record, according to an analysis by the Maine Monitor and the Bangor Daily News.

“We are grieving, we are furious, and we will not allow his death to be treated as routine or inevitable,” said Mufalo Chitam, executive director of the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition. “How much more harm must our communities endure before those with the power to act acknowledge that this has gone too far?”

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