Dallas ICE office shooter targeted agents, not detainees: Prosecutors

DALLAS (CN) — Federal officials revealed new details Thursday about the rooftop gunman they say killed a detainee and critically wounded two others at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Dallas one day earlier, claiming he acted alone in targeting ICE agents and did not seek to harm detainees.

Nancy E. Larson, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, told reporters that Joshua Jahn, 29, of Fairview, left several notes stating, “Yes, it was just me.”

“These loose notes included a game plan of the attack and target areas at the facility,” Larson said at a press conference. “He called the ICE employees ‘people showing up to collect a dirty paycheck.’ He wrote that he intended to maximize lethality against ICE personnel and to maximize property damage at the facility. He hoped to minimize any collateral damage or injury to the detainees and any other innocent people.”

Larson noted the “tragic irony of his evil plot” in only killing and injuring detainees during the attack.

No ICE employees were injured during Wednesday morning’s attack. Federal officials said Jahn fired indiscriminately at the field office from a neighboring building, including a van in the sallyport where the victims were shot.

Jahn died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and was found on top of a neighboring building, law enforcement said, adding that bullet casings inscribed with “ANTI-ICE” were found nearby. Larson said Jahn drove to the facility on Interstate 35-E north of downtown at approximately 3 a.m. with a ladder that is believed to have been used to reach the roof.

FBI Director Kash Patel revealed in a social media post Thursday that evidence “indicates a high degree of pre-attack planning” by Jahn, including the downloading of Dallas County emergency management documents listing Department of Homeland Security facilities.

“He conducted multiple searches of ballistics and the ‘Charlie Kirk Shot Video’ between 9/23-9/24,” Kash posted. “Between 8/19-8/24, he searched apps that tracked the presence of ICE agents. One of the handwritten notes recovered read, ‘Hopefully this will give ICE agents real terror, to think, ‘Is there a sniper with [armor piercing] rounds on that roof?’’”

Joseph Rothrock, special agent in charge of the FBI Dallas field office, declined to announce the identities of the detainees killed and injured, citing an ongoing process of notifying their consulates and next of kin. Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced Wednesday that one of the injured is a Mexican national, but did not disclose their identity.

The shooting comes one month after a bomb threat was made at the same Dallas field office. DHS said Bratton Wilkinson, 36, claimed to have a bomb in his backpack and was charged with making terroristic threats.

The shooting is the third attack on a Texas ICE facility within three months. Authorities say Ryan Mosqueda, 27, was shot and killed by police after he opened fire on a Border Patrol facility in McAllen on July 7. A police officer was injured responding to the shooting.

A police officer was shot in the neck during a July 4 attack on the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado. Prosecutors say attackers used fireworks and spray-painted messages of “ICE pig” and “traitor” to draw unarmed officers out of the facility. They say an AR-style rifle was found at the scene after 20–30 rounds were fired.

Wednesday’s shooting comes two weeks after the public assassination of Republican activist Charlie Kirk during an outdoor speaking event at Utah Valley University, setting off vitriolic complaints by conservatives against political attacks they say demonize Republicans. It comes 14 months after President Donald Trump was grazed in the ear by a bullet at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

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