Renee was fatally shot in the head while inside her car. Read more
The former brother-in-law of a mother shot dead by an ICE agent during immigration operations in Minneapolis has argued she ‘should have minded her own business’.
Renee Nicole Good, 37, was fatally shot in the head while inside her SUV on Wednesday, sparking mass protests in the streets and outrage from Minnesota lawmakers.
President Donald Trump and the Department of Homeland Security have defended the agent at the center of the violence, arguing he feared for his life because Good appeared to be accelerating her car in his direction.
Now, Good’s former brother-in-law Joseph Macklin has weighed in on the tragedy, telling the Daily Mail on Wednesday night she put herself in a dangerous situation without reason.
‘She had no reason to be there, in my opinion,’ he said.
‘It had nothing to do with her. She shouldn’t have been in the way. She had nothing to do with the ICE agents or immigration, so she shouldn’t have been there. She should have minded her own business.’
Joseph said Good had three children, including a six-year-old son she shared with his Air Force veteran brother, Tim Macklin Jr, who tragically died in 2023.
Her older two children from a previous relationship are in the custody of their father, Joseph said.
The remains of the SUV with a bloodied airbag after the woman was rushed to hospital
Border Patrol agents used chemical irritants to disperse a crowd trying to prevent them from leaving the scene after Good was shot
Good had three children, including a six-year-old son she shared with her Air Force veteran husband, Tim Macklin Jr (pictured), who tragically died in 2023
Macklin’s father and Good’s one-time father-in-law, Timmy Ray Macklin Sr., told The Telegraph that her death constituted murder.
‘It is horrible, it’s murder. Everybody is terribly shocked right now,’ he said.
‘She was a good, outgoing person. I didn’t agree with a lot of her ways, but it’s really sad to see these things happen.’
Now, his focus is on his orphaned grandson, noting: ‘There’s nobody else in his life. I’ll drive. I’ll fly. To come and get my grandchild.’
Macklin Sr. said Good would bring his grandson to visit the family several times each year, adding his ‘main concern right now is getting my grandchild’.
Both Joseph and his father said they were shocked when they learned of the tragedy on Wednesday evening.
Joseph described Good as an outspoken liberal, but challenged the Trump administration’s narrative that she was attempting to hit the agent with her car.
‘I just watched the video and was pretty astonished that the agent definitely wasn’t in the right,’ Joseph said.
Renee Nicole Good is pictured left with her sister and mother Donna Ganger
Her car was towed away from the scene after the shooting on Wednesday
Mourners gathered for a vigil on Wednesday night
‘She did just drive off but he wasn’t in front of her. It ain’t like she tried to run him over, from the video I’ve seen. She was just trying to get away, it looked like.’
He said he thought Good was visiting family in Kansas City at the time of the shooting. Instead, she found herself in the thick of a protest against ICE’s crackdown in Minneapolis.
‘She was very open about her opinions and politics, leaning to the left,’ he said.
‘I wish she would’ve minded her business and stayed out the way,’ he continued. ‘I know families are being broken apart and I know she was trying to help, and it’s heart breaking. But now it’s our family, and now her kids don’t have a mom… and one of them has lost both mom and dad.
‘She was a great and loving mother,’ he added. ‘And even after my brother Timmy died she always kept us included with Emerson and always brought him to see us. She was so kind hearted and she cared about everyone.
‘She was a good mother and a good person, and she didn’t deserve this.’
The mother-of-three was named by her mother Donna Ganger, who spoke to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune on Wednesday afternoon.
‘She was probably terrified,’ Ganger said.
The grieving mom denied reports Good would have been ‘part of anything like’ the protests against ICE that were taking place at the location where she was killed.
‘That’s so stupid,’ she said. ‘Renee was one of the kindest people I’ve ever known.
‘She was extremely compassionate. She’s taken care of people all her life. She was loving, forgiving and affectionate. She was an amazing human being.’
A woman claiming to be Good’s wife seemed to blame herself for the tragedy, saying she ‘made her come down here’ to the ICE protests
Protesters clash with police after a driver of a vehicle was shot on Wednesday amid an immigration enforcement surge in Minneapolis
After Macklin’s death in 2023, Good struck up a relationship with a woman, who has not yet been publicly identified but witnessed Wednesday’s events as they unfolded.
Gutwrenching vision from the scene captured the moment Good’s partner, who described herself as her wife, broke down in sobs as she blamed herself for the death.
‘I made her come down here, it’s my fault,’ she could be heard saying at one point, through tears. ‘They just shot my wife.’
‘That’s my wife, I don’t know what to do. I have a six-year-old at school… we’re new here, we don’t have anyone.’
Photos of the woman’s car in the aftermath showed children’s toys inside, including a plush animal and a child’s drawing.
Good was a poet and mother of three children who grew up in Colorado Springs.
She was shot three times in the face at a protest after she ignored ICE agents’ demands to get out of her car, reversed it and tried to drive off.
ICE claimed she deliberately drove her burgundy SUV at agents but witnesses dispute that and Mayor Jacob Frey called it ‘bulls**t‘.
