Scroll All The Way Down To See The Photosets

Photo Set 1

https://la.indymedia.org/news/2026/02/303265.php

Photo Set 2

https://la.indymedia.org/news/2026/02/303285.php

Photo Set 3

https://la.indymedia.org/news/2026/02/303305.php

Photo Set 4

ICE Detention Birthday https://la.indymedia.org/news/2026/02/303345.php

Photo Set 5

https://la.indymedia.org/news/2026/02/303325.php



On January 24th, 2026, Alex Pretti was shot 9 to 10 times in the back after his legal carry pistol was removed from it's holster by an ICE agent. He had been observing ICE operations and became involved with ICE agents who were throwing a fellow protester of diminutive stature to the ground. Agents swarmed Mr. Pretti pinning him down. One agent removed a gun from Pretti's holster after which shots were fired directly at Pretti, killing him.

Pretti was a Veteran's Administration ICU nurse.

Alex Pretti Killing Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Alex_Pretti

The men who fired into Pretti were Jesus Ochoa , a Border Patrol Agent and Raymundo Guitierrez who is a customs officer.

Almost immediately after the incident Kristy Noem and Little Stevie Miller immediately labeled Pretti as a domestic terrorist who was brandishing a firearm.



As a reminder Renee Good had been shot to death three weeks before.

Renee Good Killing Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Ren%C3%A9e_Good

By the time of this particular protest the first videos had been released into the media causing constant unrest throughout the week in Minneapolis,while culminating with this national action on January 30th.

It took just a few days to organize.

In the months before this protest the sanctuary city of Los Angeles had gone thru a slew of provocations involving ice raids and street protesting. Trump sent in 4000 National Guard to cover a two or three block area centered around the downtown federal properties.

The Five Waymos which were immolated with modern methods and shot from many, many angles were probably a cause for concern to the 47th president.



There had been some violence and ridiculous shows of urban anti alien posturing ( on horseback no less ) in MacArthur Park on July 7th.

It was staged near a kid's summer camp.

There had been raids at home depots, car washes, warehouses and food processing concerns along with fashion district workers and restaurant laborers. Anywhere where working class immigrants slaved and hustled their way to the great American goalpost was a likely target for the new and improved ICE Family Usurpation League.

From word of mouth and the call for food banks it seems as though many profilable people were hiding away in their homes, afraid to come out.

Bear in mind that the Los Angeles immigrant community is deeply family oriented.

From stories that this reporter has heard families, made up of all ages have been afraid to leave the house for fear of being snatched off the street by the federal government.

Anne Frank anyone ?

Prinsengracht 263-267 .

Perhaps at this point in the unfolding story that might be an inappropriate comparison but families are hiding away from government thugs who take their family members away to god knows where.

During 2025 Gavin Newsome, Karen Bass and Rob Bonta amongst others rapidly built a legislative - public service parapet to protect against federal incursions into personal, state, county and city boundaries that are deemed as sanctuaries or off limits to federal control.

There were many neighborhood vigils held in LA while ICE watch patrols were daily encountering ICE raids during the whole of 2025.

Whistles had been blowing for months and months here.

The Minneapolis incursion under Operation Metro Surge had on January 30th triggered over 300 rallies, marches and vigils nationwide

People were coming out in this protest and screaming through the media waves at the masked men taking away Grandparents, breadwinners, babies and moms who were no longer in the kitchen at 6 in the morning getting the kids ready for school while getting ready for a day of work that starts at 8 am and ends at six pm.

For many families in Los Angeles their family members were no longer at home.....indefinitely.

They have been locked away for various lengths of time in detention centers all over the U.S south western region.

There are no visitations allowed and the monitoring of inmate location is problematic and unreliable.

It has been estimated that the vast majority of detainees lack criminal records .

Syracuse professor Austin Kocher using ICE records estimates that 92 % of detainees have no criminal records.

Here is his mathematically derived proof …...

https://austinkocher.substack.com/p/show-your-work-the-math-behind-my

Conditions in the detention centers are reportedly atrocious with deep concerns about bedding, food and sleep issues along with health and vermin violations coupled with accusations of rape, violence, neglect and child molestation.

About 40 people have died in these centers at the date of this story's publication.

The protest and march started at 1:pm at City Hall with thousands of attendees spreading all the way to the end of Peoples Park.

The rally was organized quickly by the 50501 Movement which includes Indivisible, Move on and National Nurses United amongst many others.

The guardian has a great story about the organizing of the January 29th and 30th actions

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/31/anti-ice-protests-weekend

It was a passionate crowd citing a long list of Trumpian social and legal crimes. Something had changed again however. The ethnic layout of the crowd had grown more diverse than the first two that had shut down the 101 freeway in the previous summer..

There were fewer people that could be construed as that of a non Caucasian cohort and more white people in general.

The George Floyd Demonstrations in Los Angeles in a way had this aspect to it as well.

I had been hearing in conversations with people in the last 3 or 4 LA protests that they were very aware that non whites were vulnerable to ICE and they were there to utilize their conceived privilege in defending and speaking out for their neighbors and family members.



The energy was very high.

The signs were mostly homemade.

LAPD presence was low. Much lower than the No Kings rallies.

At City Hall People were scream-yelling and chanting new slogans about Donald Trump's outrages that ran from existential ICE complaints to Epstein condemnations to Venezuela and Greenland head jerks to signage with alarming objections to Trump's continuous attempts to rupture and slash the 238 year old United States Constitution.

The Pretti Killing was on thousands of peoples minds in a 4 acre moving space. The second Minneapolis killing brought these Angelenos out to the streets in an existential fury, where they expressed deeply pent up condemnations towards the flood of democracy destroying lies and schemes that have been the real trade mark of Mr. Trump's administration.

These people were very angry and very loud as they marched in a wildcat fashion taking over the DTLA streets. The march through the tunnel on Cesar Chaves was actually deafening.

The rally started walking down Spring Street with signs held up high. They turned onto Cesar Chavez and climbed the incline to the center of Cesar Chavez Bridge where the march ended and most people went home around three or so.

A smaller group of folks went down to the Metropolitan Detention Center and confronted the LAPD by defying dispersal orders. Fifty arrests were made for failure to disperse violations with a few assault and vandalism charges being filed as well.

Robert Stuart Lowden

Feb 18th, 2026

Los Angeles



Below are some useful Links.

Wikipedia List of Shootings by ICE including Keith Porter in Los Angeles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shootings_by_U.S._immigration_agents_in_the_second_Trump_administration

5051 https://www.fiftyfifty.one/

INDIVISIBLE

Indivisible https://indivisible.org/

Wikipedia Entry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indivisible_movement

Move On https://front.moveon.org/

National Nurses United https://www.nationalnursesunited.org/

ACLU https://www.aclu.org/

https://action.aclu.org/send-message/stop-ices-attack-our-communities

NELA Alliance for Democracy https://www.nelafordemocracy.org/home

These youngsters were very spirited. The exhaust was tolerated.