New footage yet again contradicts DHS claims about its killing of a US citizen

Body camera footage newly obtained by CBS News shows the moments leading up to and after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent fatally shot US citizen Ruben Ray Martinez in March 2025 and contradicts the Department of Homeland Security’s account of the killing. 

Martinez was 23 when an agent killed him in his car last spring in South Padre Island, Texas. Local news outlets reported on his death at the time, but described it only as an “officer-involved” shooting. Last month, ICE finally confirmed that one of its agents killed Martinez. 

But DHS, ICE’s parent agency, was quick to deflect blame. DHS claimed that Martinez “intentionally ran over” an agent “resulting in him being on the hood of the vehicle,” adding that a separate agent “fired defensive shots to protect himself, his fellow agents, and the general public.” 

The footage released by CBS on Friday tells a different story. 

As that outlet reports, Martinez’s car “was stationary or going at a very low rate of speed when he was fatally shot.” When shots are fired, “the brake lights of Martinez’ vehicle appear to be on.” Contrary to DHS’s account, the video shows no evidence that Martinez was attempting to run over an agent.

The newly released body camera footage is the latest chance for viewers to fact-check DHS’s claims about its reasoning for killing a US citizen. Following the shootings of citizens Renée Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents in Minneapolis in January, videos from bystanders contradicted DHS’s assurances that the killings were a response to physical threats or violence by Good and Pretti.

After ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed Good, then-DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said that the 37 year old was a “violent rioter” who had “weaponized her vehicle” in an “act of domestic terrorism.” Video footage from several angles sooncirculated and directly opposed that official statement from the Trump administration. The videos indicated that Good reversed her car before appearing to turn away from Ross and drive away, after telling the agent “I’m not mad at you.”

Later that month, Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez shot at Alex Pretti on a Minneapolis street, killing him. Again, the administration was quick to blame him for his death: The Border Patrol Union claimed that Pretti, who held a firearms permit, “brandishes” a weapon before being shot. But video footage released in the hours and days following the killing shows him holding a phone, not a gun, in his hand to record the agents. Video analysis from the New York Times also found that federal agents appear to pull a firearm from near Pretti’s right hip and carry it away prior to shooting him. 

In the footage of Martinez released this week, he can be seen driving slowly through an area being controlled by police and immigration agents after a car accident. Martinez’s friend, who was also in the car at the time, had previously told interrogators that Martinez may have been nervous at the scene since the pair had hung out with friends and had food and drinks that evening.

Next in the video, law enforcement begin shouting about the car going through the scene. Quickly, there are gunshots. Next, an agent pulls Martinez from the car and throws him on the ground. An agent then handcuffs Martinez before he’s given medical attention.

Rachel Reyes, Martinez’s mom, told CBS News recently in her first televised interview that she is “not a mother in denial. I’m just a mother in doubt, because I know my son and I know he’s not a threat.”

Reyes, who voted for President Donald Trump in 2024, said, “I don’t blame President Trump for the death of my son, ’cause he wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger.” “But,” she added, “I do think that something needs to be changed in that department as far as the pattern of violence or abuse and impunity.”