Jonathan Turley Blasts Mayor Frey Over ICE Shooting Probe

Adriana Stone 0 2 min read

Turley Blasts Mayor Frey Over ICE Shooting Probe

A federal ICE agent shot Renée Good in Minneapolis, and local leaders quickly demanded a role in the investigation. George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley appeared on Fox News to push back.

Turley argued the case is federal and local officials don’t have the legal right to insist on participation.

INGRAHAM: Oh, yes, they were already convicting, they are convicting that ICE officer. Here to discuss Jonathan Turley, constitutional law expert, Fox News Contributor. Jonathan, Frey is demanding that the state be involved. Walz is accusing, though, agents of contaminating the scene, the crime scene. So what law takes precedent here — precedence here? And are they within their right to say, we must be involved?

JONATHAN TURLEY, GWU LAW PROFESSOR: No, they can ask to be involved, but they have no basis upon to insist on being involved. This is a federal investigation involving a federal shooting, and they do not have to be involved. I don’t expect they will be. And possibly the worst possible person to call for that type of cooperation is Mayor Frey, who soon after the shooting announced that this officer was a murderer and used today to say that he really wasn’t injured.

Turley said the video of the encounter matters more than headlines. He described a violent collision and emphasized how fast the encounter unfolded. He warned that slowing footage down and dissecting it frame-by-frame can mislead people about how fast officers must decide.

Now, I haven’t been in his kitchen, and I haven’t seen Frey’s fridge, but this does not strike me as a kitchen encounter. When you look at that video, it is a very significant collision with this officer. And the video, most importantly captures something that’s missing on the internet as people slow down this video to the point that it seems like these officers could have gotten coffee and debated what they were going to do next. I mean, this really captures how it was a fraction of a second. The key here is to look at this from the perspective of the officer, the motivations of Good do not matter. It’s her actions that matter.

Turley laid out the legal standard plainly: what matters is whether the officer’s split-second perception and choice were reasonable under the circumstances. He noted that being reasonable doesn’t always equate to being right, but it is the measure used in these cases.

So the question is, what did the officer see in that fraction of a second? That standard favors the officer. Now, we’re going to have a lot of investigation going forward, but people need to be clear what the standard is. To say that the officer was reasonable, does not necessarily mean that the officer was right. You could still disagree with the use of lethal force. But the question is, was this within the parameters, the discretion of the officer? That standard favors the officer, in my view, from this video.

Turley also warned of politics around the case, saying Democrats could try to use public anger in Minnesota as a political tool heading into the midterms. The legal review will continue, but for Turley the starting point is clear: federal jurisdiction and a split-second decision by the officer.

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