The family of Renee Nicole Goode is hiring George Floyd’s law firm to get answers in the deadly ICE shooting
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The family of Renee Nicole Judd accused US federal immigration officers of killing a Minneapolis mother as she tried to follow agents’ instructions, and said Wednesday they had hired the same law firm representing George Floyd’s family to press for answers and accountability.
Goode’s loved ones said in a statement that they wanted Goode, 37, to be remembered as an “agent for peace” and urged the public not to use her death as a political flashpoint, according to Chicago-based Romanucci & Blandin. The company said it will release information from its investigation in the coming weeks.
The family’s decision to use the law firm came the same week that the US Justice Department said it saw no basis to open a federal civil rights investigation into the shooting by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent. The FBI investigation into Judd’s death remains ongoing.
The Trump administration defended the ICE officer’s actions, saying he fired in self-defense while standing in front of Judd’s car as it began to drive forward. But that explanation has been widely criticized by Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and others based on videos of the confrontation.
Nearly a half-dozen federal prosecutors in Minnesota resigned this week, and several supervisors in the Civil Rights Division’s criminal division in Washington have given notice of their resignations, according to people familiar with the matter.
Six prosecutors reportedly resigned Tuesday from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota. The Justice Department has pushed to investigate the widow of Renee Judd, the woman killed by an ICE agent last week, and has appeared reluctant to investigate the shooter.
Romanucci & Blandin said Good’s family wants answers about the federal operation taking place on Jan. 7 in the neighborhood where Good was killed, as well as the officers’ actions during the standoff and delays in medical assistance after the shooting. The identity of the ICE agent who opened fire has not been publicly released.
Judd’s partner, Becca Judd, and other relatives say the couple had just dropped their six-year-old child off at school and had stopped to observe law enforcement activity when officers approached them, according to the law firm.
Attorneys said Renee Nicole Goode appeared to back out of her car and move it away from a customer before the shooting, although investigators have not released an official account.
“What happened to Renee is wrong,” the company said, adding that it intends to share the results “on a rolling basis” because it believes the community is not receiving enough information elsewhere. The firm, which helped secure a $27 million US settlement for Floyd’s family, now represents Becca Goode as well as Renee Nicole Goode’s parents and siblings.
Becca Judd issued a statement to Minnesota Public Radio on Friday in which she said the couple stopped to support their neighbors: “We had whistles. They had guns.”
Becca Judd and her family did not return calls and messages from The Associated Press. Her previous statement did not provide further details about the day of the shooting and instead focused on memorializing her wife.
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