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I am not opposed to qualified immunity. I am not hostile to law enforcement. I spent part of my legal career in federal court defending officers accused of excessive force, and part of it as a prosecutor. I understand the standards that govern the use of force, and I understand how those standards are evaluated from both sides of the courtroom. I know what lawful policing looks like. And I know crime when I see it.
This case crosses that line.
The killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis by an ICE agent is not a hard legal question wrapped in political noise. It is a straightforward failure to meet the constitutional standard that governs the use of deadly force.
The law does not demand perfection from officers. It demands reasonableness.
Deadly force is lawful only when a reasonable officer would believe it is necessary to stop an imminent threat of serious bodily harm or death. That is not a slogan. It is the rule that determines whether a shooting is justified or criminal.
Based on the facts that have been made public, that standard was not met here.
One fact matters more than almost everything else: multiple armed officers were present at the scene, confronting the same circumstances, and only one fired his weapon.
That is not incidental. It is decisive.
Qualified immunity is built on objective reasonableness, not subjective fear. When trained officers assess the same situation and only one concludes that lethal force is required, the claim that the threat was immediate and unavoidable weakens dramatically. If the danger
was so obvious, so imminent, so unavoidable, why did every other officer refrain from pulling the trigger?
That is not a political question. It is a legal one.
At this point, some officials and commentators have gone further, claiming that the officer involved is protected by “absolute immunity.” That is simply wrong.
Qualified immunity and absolute immunity are not the same thing. Qualified immunity is a limited civil doctrine that can shield officers from personal liability when the law is not clearly established. It does not apply automatically, and it does not excuse unreasonable conduct.
Absolute immunity is far narrower and far more specific. It applies to a small category of actors performing uniquely protected functions, such as judges acting in their judicial role or prosecutors making charging decisions. It does not apply to law enforcement officers making split-second decisions in the field, and it has never applied to the use of deadly force during an arrest or enforcement action.
There is no legal theory under which an ICE agent shooting a civilian could be absolutely immune from scrutiny. Claiming otherwise is not a mistake. It is a misrepresentation of the law.
There is another problem that deserves far more attention. The public is being asked to believe what officials say about what happened, rather than what people can plainly see. In this case, video evidence matters. Physical facts matter. You are not required to suspend your judgment.
You can see the vehicle. You can see the angle of the wheels turned away from the officer. You can see the spacing, the timing, the movement. These details are not trivial. They are precisely the kinds of facts prosecutors and defense attorneys rely on every day to determine intent, threat, and necessity.
In court, testimony does not override physical evidence. And in a democracy, it shouldn’t either.
Deadly force is not justified by tension, protest activity, or uncertainty. It is not justified by the mere presence of a car. It is justified only when there is no reasonable alternative and the threat is immediate.
Law enforcement officers are trained accordingly. A firearm is not a compliance tool. It is not a response to ambiguity. It is the last resort.
There has been a rush to invoke immunity as if it ends the inquiry. It does not. When the facts show that a reasonable officer would not have used lethal force, immunity does not apply. At that point, the analysis is no longer about policy. It is about accountability under criminal law.
This is not anti-police. It is pro-law.
Officers who exercise restraint and follow their training deserve a system that draws clear lines. Communities deserve a system that does not ask them to unsee what they have seen.
Renee Good is dead. Qualified immunity protects good-faith policing. It does not excuse unreasonable killing.
If we cannot say that plainly, then we are not defending the rule of law. We are retreating from it.
