Did alex Pretti have an altercation with ice days before his death
Executive summary
Multiple news outlets published videos and eyewitness accounts showing Alex Pretti in a physical confrontation with federal immigration officers on Jan. 13 — eleven days before he was fatally shot — and Pretti’s family and attorney have confirmed the man in the footage is him [1] [2] [3]. The newly surfaced clips show agents wrestling Pretti to the ground after he kicked at a federal vehicle and shouted at officers, but the footage does not, on its face, establish that the earlier encounter justified the later use of lethal force, and it remains unclear whether the same officers were involved in both incidents [4] [2] [5].
1. The videos and their provenance: what emerged and who verified it
Several outlets published or described the same raw clips recorded around Jan. 13 that show a man later identified by his family as Alex Pretti engaged in a heated exchange with federal immigration officers; the footage was reported to have been captured by The News Movement and analyzed by other news organizations, and Pretti’s family attorney confirmed the identity in the videos [3] [1] [2].
2. What the footage appears to show: actions on camera
Across multiple published clips, Pretti is seen shouting at officers, kicking at the taillight of a federal vehicle, and being grabbed and taken to the ground by agents, during which his winter coat is removed and a handgun is visible at his waistband in at least one frame, while he is not shown drawing or firing it in that encounter [6] [4] [2].
3. How spokespeople and allies framed the encounter
Pretti’s attorney and family described the Jan. 13 confrontation as an instance of his being “violently assaulted by a group of ICE agents,” arguing the earlier scuffle could not justify his death on Jan. 24, while conservative commentators and some administration allies used or interpreted the footage to argue Pretti had been confrontational or aggressive in the days before the killing [1] [7] [8].
4. Media and law-enforcement response: review and competing narratives
Homeland Security Investigations said it was reviewing the Jan. 13 video after its circulation, and reporting underscores a split in official accounts — administration officials at times suggested Pretti had attacked agents, while independent video analysis published by outlets like NBC, PBS and the BBC emphasized that the earlier footage did not show him brandishing a weapon or assaulting officers in a way that would clearly warrant deadly force [4] [2] [6].
5. Limits of the publicly available record and what remains unknown
The public videos establish that an altercation took place on Jan. 13 and that the person in them has been verified by family and attorneys as Pretti, but they do not prove linkage between the Jan. 13 incident and the Jan. 24 shooting in terms of personnel, motive, or lawful justification, and reporting explicitly notes it is not known whether any officers from the Jan. 13 encounter were present at the Jan. 24 killing [3] [4] [5].
6. Why the distinction matters in the national debate
The Jan. 13 footage has been weaponized on both sides of the polarized national conversation: advocates and Pretti’s family say it shows unnecessary force that undercuts claims the later shooting was justified, while critics and some officials point to his confrontational behavior as context for the later encounter — a dispute that media coverage shows cannot be settled by the clips alone [7] [9] [10].
7. Bottom line: did an altercation occur days before his death?
Yes — multiple independent outlets published videos and eyewitness accounts showing Alex Pretti in a physical confrontation with federal immigration agents on Jan. 13, eleven days before he was shot, and Pretti’s family and attorney have publicly confirmed his identity in that footage [1] [2] [3]. What the videos do not do is resolve whether that earlier altercation legally or factually justified the lethal encounter on Jan. 24, nor do they clarify whether the same officers were involved in both incidents; those are matters still under official review and contested in public commentary [4] [5] [6].