The official story is crumbling. Less than 24 hours after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claimed their agents acted in self-defense when they gunned down nurse Alex Pretti, sworn affidavits filed in federal court tell a radically different, and far more sinister, story. Alex Pretti was not holding a weapon. He was holding a phone. He was not attacking agents. He was trying to help a woman they had shoved to the ground.

These explosive revelations come from two key witnesses—a local physician and a children’s entertainer—who watched in horror as the 37-year-old ICU nurse was executed on a Minneapolis street. Their testimony, part of a lawsuit filed by the ACLU, directly contradicts the DHS narrative that Pretti "brandished a firearm," exposing what appears to be a frantic attempt by federal authorities to cover up an extrajudicial killing.

"They Just Started Shooting"

The witness identified as a "children's entertainer," who was wearing a pink coat and standing just feet away, provided a harrowing minute-by-minute account. She describes Pretti as a Good Samaritan who stepped in to assist another bystander who had been brutalized by the agents. For his trouble, he was pepper-sprayed, tackled by four agents, and then shot at point-blank range.

"I didn't see him touch any of them," she testified, her words searing through the legal jargon of the affidavit. "He wasn't even turned toward them. It didn't look like he was trying to resist... I didn't see him with a gun. They threw him to the ground... and they just started shooting him."

The Anatomy of a Cover-Up

The disparity between the official report and the witness accounts is chasm-sized. The DHS claims Pretti was a threat; the video evidence and eyewitnesses show a man armed only with a camera and a conscience.

• The Phantom Gun: While Pretti was a licensed firearm owner, witnesses insist the gun was never in his hand. The "weapon" agents feared was likely his smartphone, recording their actions—a modern tool of accountability that they met with lethal force.
• Medical Denied: A second witness, a physician living nearby, testified that agents prevented him from rendering aid to the dying nurse. "They let him bleed out," the doctor stated, painting a picture of callous indifference that borders on depravity.
• The Kenyan Lens: This tragedy resonates deeply with the Kenyan experience of police brutality. Just as we saw during the 2024 Gen Z protests, the state's first instinct is often to criminalize the victim. The script is the same in Minneapolis as it is in Mathare: shoot first, lie later.

As the sun sets on a grieving Minneapolis, the truth is beginning to outpace the spin. Alex Pretti died trying to help a stranger. The federal agents who killed him claimed self-defense. But as the sworn testimonies stack up, it is becoming increasingly clear that the only thing they were defending was their own impunity.