Candlelight Vigil in Anoka honors Alex Jeffrey Pretti after fatal federal shooting in Minneapolis

ANOKA, Minn. — Hundreds of people gathered along Main Street in downtown Anoka on the night of Saturday, Jan. 24, holding candles in silence to honor Alex Jeffrey Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse who was shot and killed earlier that morning by a U.S. Border Patrol officer during a federal immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis, according to the Associated Press.

The Anoka gathering was one of multiple vigils tied to a statewide call circulated online as “Shine a Light for Minnesota,” which urged residents to step outside around 7 p.m. Central with a candle and stand at street corners with neighbors.

What is known, and what is disputed

Federal authorities have said the shooting was an act of self-defense and have asserted that Pretti was armed. Pretti’s family disputes that account, saying bystander video shows he was holding a phone, not a gun, and that he was trying to shield a woman from agents using chemical spray.

Pretti was an ICU nurse with the Minneapolis Veterans Affairs health system, and he was a U.S. citizen, according to his family and reporting by the AP and the Star Tribune.

The shooting triggered a day of protests and a heavy federal law enforcement presence near the scene in Minneapolis. The Washington Post reported that federal agents used chemical irritants to disperse people who gathered nearby.

In Anoka, grief and stillness

In Anoka, the tone was markedly different from the confrontations reported earlier in Minneapolis. People formed a quiet, flickering line along the sidewalks, many standing shoulder to shoulder in the cold, candles held close to protect the flame from wind. Some attendees said they came because they work in health care or know the pressures of ICU work. Others said they came because the death of a local nurse during a federal operation felt like a rupture that could not be kept at a distance.

By Sunday, Jan. 25, the night’s images, candles against storefront glass, bowed heads, and bundled families lingering in clusters, had become part of a wider statewide reckoning over the tactics and transparency of federal immigration enforcement.

Pretti’s death was the second fatal shooting in Minneapolis this month tied to federal immigration enforcement, the AP reported, following the killing of Renée Good on Jan. 7.

The next questions

For many at the Anoka vigil, the immediate demand was clarity: a full public accounting of what happened in the minutes before Pretti was shot, and a transparent review of federal actions in public spaces. The competing narratives, federal claims of a threat versus family assertions supported by video accounts, have intensified calls for evidence preservation and independent scrutiny, even as communities continue to gather, candle by candle, to mourn.

MinneapoliMedia