Family members share voicemail with alleged threats, AP reports
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who fatally shot Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine this week is an Army veteran who, according to several close relatives who spoke to the Associated Press, has a pattern of what they described as violent behavior and serious mental health struggles. The relatives told the AP that David Brouillette never should have been given a badge and gun.
Brouillette’s relatives accused him of attacking women in his life over the years, the AP reported. One shared a voicemail with the wire service from the previous winter in which he told her that he thought someone should slit her throat.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has not released the name of the officer who killed Durán Guerrero, has said the vehicle the man was in “attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon.”
The allegations from relatives have raised questions about how thoroughly DHS has vetted recruits during a hiring spree to carry out President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, according to the Associated Press.
At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents since the crackdown began, including Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian national who was shot and killed by Brouillette on Monday while in his car near his home in Biddeford, a coastal Maine city.