On a Saturday morning in late January, Michael and Susan Pretti did not get the kind of official call a family expects after a fatal shooting. They learned their son was ᴅᴇᴀᴅ the way millions of strangers did: by recognizing him on television.

Alex Jeffrey Pretti was 37, a U.S. citizen, and an intensive care nurse at the Minneapolis VA. On Jan. 24, 2026, near 26th Street and Nicollet Avenue — a stretch of south Minneapolis known as Eat Street — he was sH๏τ and killed by two federal immigration officers during Operation Metro Surge, the Trump administration’s large-scale enforcement campaign in Minnesota. He was the second U.S. citizen killed by federal immigration officers in the city that month, after Renée Good.

Seven months later, his parents and sister, Micayla, sat down with George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America. It was their first television interview since the shooting. They said they still want a complete public accounting, official identification of the officers who fired, and accountability. “We’ve seen what happened. The videos are pretty clear,” Michael said. “But we want justice.”

How the family found out

Micayla said her husband first received a call from an unknown number asking if they knew “an Alex J. Pretti” and whether he might have been involved in an incident with ICE. She thought it might be a scam. Then her brother’s phone went to voicemail. Susan called the hospital and said she could not get confirmation. By then, footage was already on the air. Michael recalled recognizing their son and realizing, as they watched, that no one from the government had called them first. Susan said they still felt they had not received a full official explanation.

Two public stories of the same morning

Federal officials initially described Pretti as a violent threat. The Department of Homeland Security said he approached Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm handgun and violently resisted when officers tried to disarm him. Senior officials used far sharper language in the hours that followed, including “domestic terrorism,” “ᴀssᴀssin,” and claims that he intended maximum harm to law enforcement. President Trump later called him an “agitator” and “possible insurrectionist,” citing an earlier confrontation.

Bystander videos, reviewed by multiple news organizations, painted a different sequence. Pretti is seen holding a phone and recording. An officer pushes a woman toward him. Pretti appears to move toward her. Officers use pepper spray and take him to the ground. An officer can be heard shouting about a gun. Video appears to show an officer removing a firearm from Pretti’s person while he is restrained. SH๏τs follow — reporting based on the footage describes about 10 sH๏τs in a matter of seconds, including after he is down. City officials said he had a lawful permit to carry. News organizations that examined the videos said they did not show him brandishing the gun at officers before the takedown.

A later internal CBP ᴀssessment, reported by NPR, described resistance during an attempted arrest and officers firing after someone yelled that he had a gun. That account, NPR noted, did not match the administration’s first public claim that Pretti had approached officers intending a mᴀssacre.

There is also an earlier episode. Video from 11 days before the shooting shows Pretti in a separate confrontation with federal agents, including damage to a vehicle taillight. The family and their lawyer have argued that earlier clash does not answer what happened on Jan. 24, when he was filming and, they say, trying to help a woman.

Who he was, in his family’s telling

Those who knew him described a nurse who liked the outdoors, cared about patients, and was unsettled by the enforcement operation in his city. His family has insisted he was an observer that morning, not a marcher at a formal protest, and that the phone in his hand was the point. “I was not shocked that he helped somebody,” Susan said. Her shock, she added, was that seven months had pᴀssed without what she considers the full truth or accountability.

The investigation that still feels unfinished

Days after the shooting, the Justice Department opened a federal civil rights investigation, with the FBI in the lead and the Civil Rights Division involved — a shift from an early plan that put Homeland Security components at the center. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche called it a standard FBI review of a shooting with circumstances that warranted a closer look. The family lawyer, Steven L. Schleicher, said the family’s demand was a fair examination of the facts.

By August, that probe was still described as active. The family said a July 13 meeting with the U.S. attorney in Minnesota left them with more questions than answers. DOJ has said families are typically contacted later in a case — at indictment, a plea, trial, or sentencing — not during an open investigation. DHS has said the matter remains under investigation. The FBI has declined to comment. Schleicher has called that posture inadequate and accused the government of shielding the officers.

In February, ProPublica reported that government records identified the two officers who fired as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and CBP officer Raymundo Gutierrez. Federal agencies have not made an official public identification in the way the family wants. Micayla said she still wants the names released. Susan asked why the people who fired should simply continue their lives while her family waits.

Where things stand now

As of late August 2026, there has been no public announcement of criminal charges against the officers. The civil rights investigation has not produced a charging decision that has been made public. The White House, asked about earlier remarks, told PEOPLE that President Trump views Pretti’s death as a tragedy and supports a fact-based investigation. The family says they have received no personal apology for the language used about their son.

That is the unresolved center of the case: a legally armed American nurse on a Minneapolis street, a chaotic enforcement scene, competing official and video accounts, and a family that first saw the worst moment of their lives on television — and, seven months later, says they are still waiting for the government to treat that moment as a question that must be answered in public.