The Department of Homeland Security reportedly hired an ex-cop who was involved in at least four deadly shootings — and profanely described himself as having been a “savage” — to train immigration enforcement agents in the use of firearms and other tactics.
David Norman, the founder and owner of TruKinetics LLC of Gilbert, Arizona, received a $27,748 government contract in 2024, four years after retiring as a police officer in Phoenix, according to a Monday report by Wired.
During his time as a cop, Norman opened fire on armed suspects six times, killing four people and wounding two others, according to records reviewed by Wired.
Following his retirement, he reportedly told The Modern Cop podcast in 2021 that he’d been a “f****** savage,” saying, “I wanted those experiences. I was super aggressive.”
Norman didn’t return an email from The Independent but a spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is part of DHS, said in a prepared statement Tuesday that “ICE strictly adheres to the Federal Acquisition Regulation and applicable Department of Homeland Security acquisition policies. All vendors are subject to rigorous vetting and eligibility verification prior to any award or modification.”
Norman told Wired that his company conducted training sessions in Arizona and Fort Benning, Georgia, for members of Homeland Security Investigations’ Special Response Team based in Arizona.
“They’re top dudes, and it was an honor to work with them,” he said.
Members of DHS SRTs, which are similar to police SWAT teams, have been implicated in the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, who was carrying a licensed handgun, during protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Minneapolis earlier this year, according to Wired. Both killings drew national attention during the aggressive deportation efforts by President Donald Trump’s administration earlier in the year.
Norman said TruKinetics didn’t train agents on how to handle crowd control or active shooters but he declined to elaborate, according to Wired.
“It sounds like you’re one of those dudes trying to do a hit piece on HSI,” he reportedly said.
Customs and Border Protection didn’t respond to questions about how many teams and operators were trained by TruKinetics, according to Wired.
Homeland Security Investigations is an arm of ICE, which says Special Response Teams were created to “conduct high-risk enforcement operations” with a “greater than normal probability of injury or death to the law enforcement officer or the person(s) being arrested,” according to a 2005 handbook.
Teams are supposed to carry out their operations “safely, professionally and in a manner that maximizes officer and public safety,” the handbook says.
Their training includes three weeks at the Army’s Fort Benning, including “officer mindset” and highly realistic “force-on-force sessions,” according to ICE.
Norman acknowledged his involvement in the four fatal shootings during a 2021 deposition tied to a lawsuit over the death of a suspect in an attempted restaurant robbery, according to Wired.
He was cleared of wrongdoing in all of the shootings and the lawsuit was dismissed, with Norman telling Wired that the dead man’s family “was looking for a payout and the judge saw through that.”
Phoenix-based civil rights lawyer Steve Benedetto, who represented the family, described Norman’s police unit as “group of plainclothes cowboys” who watched suspect Jacob Harris and several companions commit a holdup before engaging in high-speed pursuit.
“Norman stood out to me as especially aggressive,” Benedetto told Wired. “He’s the last guy on earth who should be training a tactical team.”
In 2024, the Justice Department faulted the Phoenix Police Department for a “pattern or practice” of unconstitutional conduct, including unjustified deadly force in shootings from January 2019 to December 2022, and had “trained its officers that all force — even deadly force — is de-escalation.”
Last year, the Trump administration closed the case and rescinded the DOJ’s findings.
John Sandweg, former acting ICE director under President Barack Obama, was also critical of the Trump administration’s use of Special Response Team members for roving migrant patrols that can lead to clashes with demonstrators.
“The general idea of SRTs is that they’d be used against people who posed a significant risk to public safety: those with a violent criminal history, gang association or other factors that would be the objective basis for an elevated risk assessment,” Sandweg told Wired. “What are we doing deploying them to deal with protesters? It’s a recipe for disaster.”
