Wife Of Woman Killed By ICE Makes First Public Statement Since Shooting

The wife of Renee Good, the woman shot and killed by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer this week in Minneapolis, spoke out Friday for the first time since the incident, saying her partner had been “made of sunshine.”

“This kindness of strangers is the most fitting tribute,” Becca Good wrote in a statement published by Minneapolis Public Radio, referring to the public support she has received since her wife’s death, “because if you ever encountered my wife, Renee Nicole Macklin Good, you know that above all else, she was kind. In fact, kindness radiated out of her.”

Renee Good, 37, was shot and killed by an ICE officer on Wednesday morning while in her car. Videos taken by bystanders show Good attempting to turn her car on a street where several ICE officers were present. Three of them surrounded her car as she reversed her SUV and pulled forward. As she attempted to pull away, an immigration officer fired three shots through her windshield and her open driver’s side window.

Becca Good was on foot, outside of the vehicle, when the shots were fired.

“Renee sparkled. She literally sparkled,” Becca Good wrote. “I mean, she didn’t wear glitter but I swear she had sparkles coming out of her pores. All the time. You might think it was just my love talking but her family said the same thing. Renee was made of sunshine.”

Becca Good thanked people for the overwhelming support she and her family have received across the country this week and wrote that she, Renee and their son recently moved from Kansas City, Missouri, to Minneapolis. “There was a strong shared sense here in Minneapolis that we were looking out for each other. Here, I had finally found peace and safe harbor,” Becca wrote. “That has been taken from me forever.”

Renee Good leaves behind three children, two from her first marriage and a third from her second marriage. She had just dropped off her youngest, a 6-year-old boy, at elementary school before she and her wife encountered ICE officers on the street, her ex-husband told The Associated Press.

“We stopped to support our neighbors,” Becca Good wrote in her statement. “We had whistles. They had guns.”

Thousands have marched across the country to mourn Renee Good and condemn ICE since the fatal shooting on Wednesday. The Department of Homeland Security has claimed that the officer shot into Renee Good’s window in self-defense, alleging that Good attempted to run the official over with her car during an ICE operation. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused Renee Good of perpetrating “an act of domestic terrorism.” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey dismissed DHS’s accusation as “bullshit.”

No video of the incident shows Renee Good attempting to run over ICE agents with her car. Instead, bystander footage from the incident disputes the Trump administration’s narrative and shows Renee Good was trying to drive away when the officer fired his gun.

Read Becca Good’s full statement here.