Relatives of Renee Good filed a pair of lawsuits against the federal government and immigration officials on Thursday over both the US citizen’s killing at the hands of an immigration agent and an alleged conspiracy to interfere with civil rights in Minnesota’s Twin Cities.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jonathan Ross fatally shot Good, a 37-year-old writer, poet, and mother of three, in Minneapolis on January 7, while ICE was deployed there as part of President Donald Trump’s “Operation Metro Surge.”

Filed in the US District Court for the District of Minnesota on behalf of her partner, Becca Good, and brother, Brent Ganger—the trustee for next of kin, including her children—the complaint against the United States lays out the details of the shooting and what followed, alleging wrongful death, battery, assault, false imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligence.

The suit notes that Renee Good had primary custody of her 6-year-old son and provided primary care for her 12- and 15-year-olds. In addition to highlighting the “immense physical, mental, and emotional pain” she suffered in her final moments, it stresses that “Renee’s children, parents, and siblings have been forever deprived of the economic support, services, advice, comfort, assistance, protection, and companionship of someone who was monumentally important to them and who cared for them deeply.”

Becca Good, who was in the vehicle with her partner and their dog during the shooting, shared in a Thursday statement that “every morning, she is my first thought. I think about how the kids are growing up without their mama, and how I will grow old without the love of my life. I think about how we should have had 40 more years together. But I also think about what she would have wanted after all of this.”

“As we have tried to navigate our own massive loss, I am also devastated by how many other lives have been destroyed in this darkest of times,” said Good, whose partner’s death was shortly followed by immigration agents’ fatal shooting of Alex Pretti on January 24, also in Minneapolis. “So many other families are dealing with the loss of their loved ones; to everyone who has had to witness it—the pain of this moment extends far beyond our family.”

“What happened to us should never happen to any family,” she stressed. “No child should grow up without a parent because of it. No one should lose their sister or their daughter. No one should have to live without their soulmate. Accountability—real accountability—is the only way to make sure that no other family has to go through what we have.”

That’s where the second complaint comes in. It names not only Ross but also Trump Homeland Security Adviser Stephen Miller, former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her adviser Corey Lewandowski, “border czar” Tom Homan, former acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, former Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Greg Bovino, and 10 other federal agents.

“These two civil complaints seek to remedy two distinct, but related wrongs. We seek accountability for the unconscionable and unconstitutional use of force by a federal agent that killed Renee on January 7th. But we also seek accountability for the discriminatory and violent operation that placed Jonathan Ross on Portland Avenue that day,” explained Benjamin Berkman, senior attorney at Romanucci & Blandin, the firm representing the family.

“Those in the highest rungs of power authorized armed, masked men to terrorize Minnesotans on the basis of their perceived race or national origin,” the lawyer said. “To achieve that goal, they also sought to silence community members who refused to look away. Congress passed the Ku Klux Klan Act to hold accountable those who conspire to deny the equal protection of the laws. Today’s filings intend to do just that.”

While Trump has sent ICE into various US communities since returning to office last year after running on a promise to pursue mass detention and deportations, the invasion of the Twin Cities followed a series of his racist statements directed at the area’s Somali immigrants and their families. The filing alleges that “Operation Metro Surge was conceived, ordered, and carried out to satisfy the president’s expressed animus toward people of Somali origin and Hispanic people.”

In practice, the operation involved “masked agents roving public streets and targeting people of Somali descent and origin and Hispanic individuals without regard to immigration status,” the complaint says. It highlights that “like many members of their community,” Becca and Renee Good, two white women, “were concerned about ICE’s conduct and its effect on their friends and neighbors.”

As with the first filing, the second also lays out the details of the shooting and its aftermath: “Renee was driving the couple’s Honda Pilot” and stopped on Portland Avenue, the document says. “Exercising her First Amendment rights, Becca exited the vehicle and began filming ICE activity while Renee remained in the car and honked her horn to warn her neighbors.”

It details the confrontation with masked agents, including one who “turned away the aid offered to her as she lay dying,” and attempts by the Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, to blame Renee Good for her own death—including claims, contradicted by video evidence, that she “weaponized her vehicle” in “an act of domestic terrorism.”

Antonio M. Romanucci, the law firm’s founding partner, emphasized that “unquestionably, unequivocally, neither Renee nor Becca was the worst of the worst. They were exactly as their name says—Good folks. No one was armed. No one was a domestic terrorist. They had their pet dog in the car.”

“Indeed, Renee told masked agents she wasn’t mad at them; her last words clearly reflected her state of mind. Renee had the right to speak, express herself, assemble, observe, and leave the scene unharmed and alive,” he continued. “Today, these lawsuits are the beginning of the ultimate legal weapon in uncovering the truth behind this unlawful use of deadly force and the nefarious conspiracies behind the invasion of American cities by American law enforcement officers.”

Renee Good’s brother, Ganger, declared Thursday that “I stand here with fierce determination to do what is right for my sister, for her children, and for our country—and that is to insist on accountability.”

“What happened to her on January 7th and what has happened to far too many people in the last year is not what America is about,” he added. “We can and must do better, and the Constitution must be the roadmap back to decency and the rule of law.”

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