A woman shot by an immigration agent after she allegedly rammed his vehicle on Chicago’s Southwest Side over the weekend was ordered released from jail Monday following a hearing where her attorney claimed it was federal agents patrolling the city with assault rifles who were the real danger.
The incident in Brighton Park on Saturday ratcheted up an already tense atmosphere between federal law enforcement and the communities that have been subject to nearly a month of “Operation Midway Blitz,” the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration enforcement push.
That tension was on full display Monday at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse, where dozens of supporters of Marimar Martinez, the woman who was shot, as well as her co-defendant, Anthony Ian Santos Ruiz, packed U.S. Magistrate Judge Heather McShain’s 17th floor courtroom for their initial court appearances.
A prosecutor said the actions of Martinez and Ruiz were “extremely dangerous and extremely reckless,” putting both the officers and potentially innocent bystanders in harm’s way.
Martinez’s attorney, Christopher Parente, called into question the government’s version of events, including what was captured on the body camera of one of the agents in the vehicle.
Parente, who said he’d viewed the body camera footage multiple times, revealed in court that just before the shooting, one of the agents was captured saying, “Do something, bitch,” while his hands were on his assault rifle.
In asking that they both be held without bond pending trial, Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Hennessy called the pair a danger to the community.
“They endangered one another, and they also put in danger anybody who was on the street, other motorists or people who were walking around in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Hennessy said.
Hennessy said both Martinez and Ruiz were part of a convoy of cars that had been following agents as they conducted immigration enforcement operations, and that before the crash and shooting near 39th and Kedzie, Martinez had been broadcasting the pursuit on Facebook Live, “laying on her horn” and “yelling loudly” at the agents.
“This was intentional,” Hennessy said. “They were not there by mistake. This was not the spur of the moment.”
Parente said it was clear the agents aren’t from Chicago in part because the body camera captured them butchering the street name “Kedzie.”
He said the real danger comes from having trigger-happy agents in fatigues and armed with assault rifles driving around unfamiliar neighborhoods in an unmarked vehicle whose only markings were an Uber logo.
“It’s crazy what’s happening out there,” Parente said. “It’s dangerous, but it’s not Ms. Martinez who is the danger.”
He also said the footage showed the agent driving the vehicle suddenly “turn the wheel to the left,” then jump out and “just start shooting.” At least some of the five shots went through the front passenger side of Martinez’s vehicle, indicating they were not being rammed head-on, Parente said.
“What I do know is, it was Ms. Martinez who has seven holes in her body from five shots from this agent, who fired within seconds of getting out of this vehicle,” Parente said.
After the shooting, Parente said another agent walked up to the one wearing the camera and said, “Hey, what happened?” The agent pointed to his chest and said, “Hey don’t speak. You’re good,” according to Parente’s account.
Hennessy did not respond to those specific allegations, but argued the camera also picked up the agents saying, “We’re getting boxed in! We gotta get out of here! She’s going to make contact,” right before the car is struck on both sides.
Hennessy also noted that Martinez had a loaded pistol in her purse at the time, and even though she has a concealed-carry license and never brandished it, having a gun at that scene made the situation all that more volatile.
McShain agreed that the charges were serious, but said the defendants’ lack of criminal history, community support and full-time employment tipped the scale to being released on bond.
“This is a horrible situation,” the judge said. “It is a miracle to me that no one else was more seriously injured.”
Martinez and Ruiz both appeared in court dressed in orange jail clothes and shackled at the ankles. The hearing was attended by numerous relatives and supporters of both Martinez and Ruiz. One called out “We love you!” as Martinez was led from the courtroom. Another told Ruiz, “Keep your head up. Pray.”
Martinez, 30, and Ruiz, 21, both of Chicago, were charged in a criminal complaint filed Sunday with forcibly assaulting, impeding and interfering with a federal law enforcement officer, which carries up to 20 years in prison.
According to the complaint, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent was driving south of Pershing Road near the intersection of West 39th Place and South Kedzie Avenue on Saturday with two other CBP agents as passengers.
The officers were acting as a “security detail” and were “followed by a convoy of civilian vehicles,” including a silver Nissan Rogue driven by Martinez and a black GMC Envoy driven by Ruiz, according to the complaint.
The convoy of civilian vehicles followed the agents closely and pursued the (border patrol agents) aggressively,” the complaint stated, including “disobeying traffic laws, including running red lights and stop signs, driving in the wrong lane, and driving the wrong way down one-way streets.”
Martinez drove off after the shooting but paramedics discovered her and her vehicle at a repair shop about a mile away, according to the complaint. Ruiz also drove away after the collisions, but law enforcement located him and his vehicle at a gas station about a half block away, the complaint stated.
All three agents were equipped with body cameras, but the camera of only one of the passengers was switched on at the time of the incident, according to the complaint.
The body camera footage has not been released publicly. On Monday, the FBI posted a separate security video on its website that purportedly showed the crash and its aftermath, although most of it happens at the top or just off the frame.
In the footage, from a nearby business, shows Ruiz’s car speeding behind the agents’ Chevrolet Tahoe, which slows down and is then struck. Ruiz’s car then backs up, crashes into a parked car, and does a U-turn and speeds off before returning to the parking lot of the business.
Martinez’s silver sedan, meanwhile, appears to be following behind and swerves to the left of the officers’ car. The shooting itself was not captured.
After the incident, both Gov. JB Pritzker and Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth, both Democrats, accused Republican President Donald Trump and aggressive federal immigration enforcement of creating confrontation.
“They are using Gestapo tactics in Chicago, and this is what Trump wants to do, right?” Duckworth said. “He wants to intimidate the people of Chicago. That’s not going to happen.”
But Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, said the “attack” was part of a larger pattern of violence against immigration agents during the Trump administration’s ongoing “Operation Midway Blitz.”
“The violence and dehumanization of these men and women who are simply enforcing the law must stop,” McLaughlin said in a statement.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com
