Witness provides details about Alex Pretti shooting in court filing, showing feds initiated the confrontation, not the other way around -- as White House claims

Feds spray Alex Pretti before beating him on the ground (The Guardian)

An anonymous witness has provided details in a court filing  about Saturday's fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal agents in Minnesota. The witness' account largely matches the description of events we reported in a post on Sunday (1/25/26). Here is the latest from a report at ABC News under the headline "Witness describes shooting in federal court filing":

An unnamed witness provided more details in a federal court filing Saturday night about the shooting in Minneapolis of 37-year-old Alex Pretti.

The witness, whose name was redacted in court documents, said immigration agents pepper-sprayed three observers, including Pretti, before an agent shoved a woman to the ground.

"More agents came over and grabbed the man who was still trying to help the woman get up."

The witness said that agents pushed Pretti to the ground and added that "it didn't look like he was trying to resist, just trying to help the woman up."

The most important point from the witness' statement: Agents initiated the confrontation with Pretti, not the other way around -- as has been described by accounts from the Trump White House. The witness goes on to describe a brutal act of violence against Pretti, which he/she captured on video:

"They threw him to the ground. Four or five agents had him on the ground and they just started shooting him," the witness said. "They shot him so many times."

The witness said they recorded a video that "accurately depicts the events leading up to the agents shooting him and several minutes afterwards."

The declaration was filed Saturday by the ACLU of Minnesota as part of an emergency motion to lift a stay on a federal judge's order that barred immigration agents from arresting protesters or using nonlethal weapons against them.