Why No Charges? Friends, Family of Man Killed by Off-Duty ICE Officer Ask After New Year’s Eve Shooting.

After a man was shot and killed by an off-duty U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer on New Year’s Eve in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, his friends and family as well as community groups are questioning why the agent has not been arrested in connection with the shooting.

The Los Angeles Police Department has released little information about the killing of Keith Porter, 43, and the ICE agent who shot him has not been identified. Jsané Tyler, a cousin of Porter, said in an interview that he had been firing a newly acquired gun into the air to ring in the new year before he was killed.

Keith Porter. Photo: Instagram/@ogskoot.

LAPD and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department have warned against the longstanding practice of shooting into the air in celebration for decades. It can be deadly as the bullets fall to the ground, and it’s also a felony in California. But it persists in some areas.

In a statement, Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the officer was in his apartment when he heard Porter firing. 

“The officer took his ICE-authorized firearm and left his apartment to investigate,” McLaughlin said in a statement. When the officer encountered the armed suspect and identified himself as law enforcement, McLaughlin said, Porter pointed and shot the weapon at the agent, and refused to drop it. 

“He was forced to defensively use his weapon and exchanged gunfire with the shooter,“ McLaughlin said. 

Two neighbors told Capital & Main that they heard three shots followed by a pause lasting about one minute. Then another volley of three shots followed. Carter Nuñez, a resident of the apartment complex where the shooting occurred, said he saw Porter’s body lying in a courtyard, and police officers searching for bullets with metal detectors. 

“The ICE presence is very high, and the things they are doing around the community are terrible,” Nuñez said. “It’s not something you find comfort in living with.”

Another resident who would not give their name said they found bullet holes in a wall. 

Friends, family and advocates have expressed concern over the lack of an arrest or charges in the case.

“This was another Black father, son, cousin, villager, snatched without any regard to his life,” said Tyler, Porter’s cousin. “And once again, this is law enforcement not being held accountable for the loss of life.” 

Tyler grew up in Compton alongside Porter, who was nicknamed Pooter. She said her cousin left behind two daughters, ages 9 and 20, and that he moved to Northridge about a year ago to be closer to his girlfriend. Tyler last saw him a few days before the shooting at her home during a family gathering. 

“Keith was a very loving person, and he also wasn’t crazy. So there is no way that he turned around and threatened the man with the gun,” she said.

Tyler recalled her grandfather and other neighbors frequently celebrating the New Year by shooting guns into the air, and thought Porter was probably keeping up that same practice in Northridge. 

Porter with his grandmother. Photo: Instagram/@ogskoot.

Nearly 100 people gathered on Sunday at a vigil for Porter organized by Black Lives Matter Los Angeles outside of the apartment complex where the shooting took place.

“If we can imagine someone else stepping outside of their apartment and being shot by someone who was not an ICE agent, what would happen to that person? We would expect that there would be an arrest,” Melina Abdullah, one of the co-founders of Black Lives Matter Los Angeles, said in an interview. “The whole handling of everything tells us that it’s a green light to cops as criminals. It enables people to engage in vigilantism.” 

The investigation into Porter’s death is being handled by LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division, Homicide Special Section. The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Justice System Integrity Division will review all evidence and determine whether the agent acted lawfully. 

Experts told Capital & Main that the L.A. District Attorney’s Office could charge and prosecute the agent, with some limitations. The supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution grants immunity from state prosecution to federal officers acting in the scope of their duties. 

“State laws can’t override anything that is a valid federal action. But the supremacy cause does have limits and it requires them to be acting in the scope of their duties and responsibilities as a federal agent,” said Aramis Ayala, executive director of local district attorney network Fair & Just Prosecution. 

The shooting marks the latest incident of violence by DHS agents in Southern California that has included aggressive detainments and arrests, injuries, deaths and other off-duty incidents, including one in which Border Patrol Agent Isaiah Hodgson pulled out his gun inside of a women’s bathroom in Long Beach in July. Hodgson was later found dead of a drug overdose.

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