The state police in Illinois said on Tuesday that they were investigating the fatal shooting of a man by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent last summer in suburban Chicago.
The shooting of the man, Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez, who was from Mexico, came in the midst of the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration in the Chicago area, and it immediately drew outrage from residents and local officials.
Federal officials claimed that Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez, who they said was in the country illegally, drove a Subaru into officers and dragged an officer while fleeing a traffic stop in Franklin Park, Ill., near O’Hare International Airport. The agency said one officer had been severely injured.
But video of the shooting, which took place on Sept. 12, raised questions about aspects of that account.
Footage reviewed by The New York Times showed Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez attempting to flee from officers. But it did not show Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez, 38, hitting an officer with his car, and an officer was heard on one of the videos saying his own injuries were “nothing major.”
Department of Homeland Security officials did not immediately respond for a request to comment on Tuesday night about the Illinois State Police investigation. Federal officials also did not immediately respond to questions about the status of the officer who fired or of any internal investigations into the shooting.
The investigation of Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez’s death, and any attempt to bring criminal charges, could face several hurdles.
Law enforcement officers have wide latitude to use deadly force in situations in which they reasonably fear that they or someone else is at risk of death or significant injury. And the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause bars the state prosecution of federal officers in a broad range of circumstances.
Melaney Arnold, a spokeswoman for the State Police, said in an emailed statement on Tuesday night that the Franklin Park Police Department had requested the state investigation. Once it is finished, she said, the findings will be turned over to the county prosecutor’s office. She declined to comment further.
The police chief in Franklin Park, a Chicago suburb with about 18,000 residents, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The shooting of Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez was one of several events during the immigration crackdown in the Chicago area that raised questions about how federal agents were using force and interacting with residents.
While the Trump administration described the campaign, known as Operation Midway Blitz, as essential for public safety, state and local officials dismissed it as politically punitive and constitutionally dubious.
As masked agents deployed tear gas and made hundreds of arrests, federal judges raised concerns about their tactics, their use of force, their justification for locking up immigrants and the conditions under which those immigrants were being held. The courts also blocked an attempt by President Trump to deploy National Guard troops on the streets of Chicago.
In addition to the shooting of Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez, federal agents shot and wounded a woman, Marimar Martinez, during the campaign. Federal charges against Ms. Martinez were later dismissed.
Last week, a state commission in Illinois released a report that described Operation Midway Blitz as a “whole-of-government approach to suppress opposition and pressure Illinois because of its immigrant-friendly policies, under the guise of achieving mass deportation.”
Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat who is thought to be weighing a run for president, named Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez and Ms. Martinez in a statement after that report was released. He expressed hope that “law enforcement agencies will review this evidence and take any steps in their power to deliver justice to Illinoisans.”
In Minnesota, where federal agents shot three people during a subsequent immigration crackdown, federal officials have resisted sharing with their state counterparts information as basic as the names of the agents who fired.
