Who is David Brouillett, the shooting ICE officer in Maine? Family says he is 'extremely mentally ill'

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer who shot and killed a Colombian man in Maine this week is an Army veteran who has struggled with serious mental health issues since early childhood, his ex-wife told The Associated Press.

David Brouillette, a U.S. ICE officer, shot and killed Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian national, on July 13, 2026, during an operation in Biddeford, Maine.

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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which has not released the name of the officer who killed Durán Guerrero, said “the vehicle attempted to flee the scene and out of fear for public safety, the officer fired his weapon.”

Brouillette did not respond to AP text messages or an email seeking comment.

To three relatives who said they had spoken to him since the shooting, including his ex-wife and daughter, he told them he acted in self-defense.

Ex-wife’s account

According to those close to him, Brouillette was prone to violence and had racist beliefs, NPR reported.

Ashley Brouillette told NPR that her ex-husband, David, was the police officer who fatally shot Joan Durán Guerrero four times during an attempted traffic stop in Biddeford, Maine.

She said she found out he was the officer in charge when he called her Wednesday and asked her to vouch for his character.

“He asked me to basically speak well of his character, not speak ill of him. And if I couldn’t speak ill of him, then just not speak to anybody at all,” she told NPR.

“And I told him I’m not going to lie to him. He asked me not to talk about the abuse in our marriage. And I told him again I’m not going to lie to him,” she quoted her as saying.

“He became physically violent”

Brouillette, 37, told his ex-wife Ashley Brouillette late last year that he was hired by ICE.

She said that because of his long history of psychiatric problems, she thought he was having a mental health episode and did not believe him.

She didn’t realize he was telling the truth until this week, when videos of the moments surrounding the shooting began circulating online.

Ashley Brouillette told the AP that she spoke to her ex-husband in an audio call on Facebook and he admitted to killing Durán Guerrero.

Their 18-year-old daughter, Madison Brouillette, also told the AP that her father called her Wednesday and said he had shot Durán Guerrero.

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David and Ashley Brouillette were high school sweethearts who married in 2007.

She said she divorced him in 2009 because he became physically abusive to her, which began after she became pregnant with their daughter.

According to Ashley Brouillette, he once threw boiling water on her while she was holding their child — an incident that was also recounted by her mother, Avis Collins.

The abuse continued after she left him, she said.

“Appalling and violent behavior”

Meanwhile, his relatives told The Associated Press that David Brouillette has a history of frightening and violent behavior.

They accused him of assaulting the women in his life over the years, and one shared a voicemail with the AP from last winter in which he told her he thought someone should cut her throat.

Brouillette’s troubling background further casts doubt on how thoroughly the Department of Homeland Security screened recruits when it embarked on a hiring spree to help carry out President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration.

‘Dave Needs Advice’

David Brouillette does not appear to have a criminal record in Maine, as a check with the Maine Department of Public Safety returned no records for him.

But hundreds of family court records obtained from the Augusta County Clerk’s Office detail years of physical and verbal abuse allegations made by his second ex-wife on behalf of herself and his daughters.

The ex-wife, whom the AP is not identifying for fear of retaliation, said he stalked and harassed her and physically and verbally abused their daughter, according to multiple requests for temporary protection orders.

Brouillette tackled her teenage daughter and smashed spaghetti into her hair and dragged her daughter around the house as she cried during another outburst, she said.

“Dave needs counseling or something for his PTSD and depression,” she wrote in a request for a temporary protective order on behalf of his teenage daughter, which a judge granted in 2021, according to the AP.

In court filings, David Brouillette said his second ex-wife slandered him.

“I watched my dad wrestle”

His oldest daughter, Madison Brouillette, said she also witnessed her father’s volatility.

“I watched my dad struggle a lot with a lot of things,” she told the AP.

She said she came home from school one day and he told her he was sitting on a tree stump with a gun to his head.

“If you don’t really, really take care of yourself, there’s no way to protect other people. And with my dad, he never wanted to help,” she said.

Bipolar disorder?

A close relative of David Brouillette told the AP that he was diagnosed as a child with severe bipolar disorder and attention deficit disorder, a diagnosis confirmed by Ashley Brouillette.

A close relative described him as “extremely mentally ill” and said he had attempted suicide twice at the age of 12 and had been hospitalized several times.

A relative said they became estranged for years after cutting off contact because they feared he would hurt them. He did not respond to their outing this week, the relative added.

Brouillette “rejected by military recruiters”

Growing up in Gardiner, a town of about 6,000 about 60 miles (97 kilometers) northeast of Biddeford, where Monday’s shooting occurred, David Brouillette was fascinated by law enforcement and the military, his relatives said.

High school yearbook photos show he was a member of the school’s Naval Junior ROTC and wrote that he planned to go to college and become a police officer.

Brouillette was initially rejected by military recruiters because of his mental health diagnosis, but recruiters encouraged him to come off his medication for a year and reapply, which he did, his next of kin said.

He eventually managed to enlist.

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According to U.S. military records, Brouillette enlisted as a chemical equipment repairman in the Maine Army National Guard, but then changed jobs and became a medical logistics specialist.

He was in the Guard from November 2007 to January 2010, according to records provided by the Pentagon.

In a 2009 Kennebec Journal article, Brouillette is listed as a private in the Maine Army National Guard’s 152nd Maintenance Company in Augusta.

In January 2010, he joined the regular army as a human intelligence collector.

Brouillette deployed to Afghanistan from May 2012 to February 2013 and finally left the Army as a sergeant in December 2015.

His next of kin believes Brouillette’s time abroad exacerbated his emotional struggles: “Afghanistan destroyed him — it turned him into a murdering monster, a machine.

They took someone who was extremely mentally ill and turned him into a killing machine.”

Life after the military

After his release, Brouillette held a slew of jobs — some in or around law enforcement — and was injured in a firefighter training accident, public records and court documents show.

Brouillette worked for the Maine Correctional Center — a medium-security prison — and the state Department of Health and Human Services, spending less than a year at each.

In 2019, court documents show he was a police officer at a Department of Veterans Affairs medical center near the state capital of Augusta.

A Department of Veterans Affairs spokesman referred questions about Brouillette’s employment to DHS on Thursday.

But by the end of 2021, he wrote in a text message that was part of court filings, he was broke, going to school full-time and making money delivering food for DoorDash.

Brouillette was enrolled in the firefighting program at Southern Maine Community College and, according to the lawsuit he filed over his injury, he was struck in the head by a steel beam while unloading a trailer at a training facility.

He suffered a concussion and post-concussion syndrome with symptoms including impaired memory, cognitive deficits, headaches, dizziness and sensitivity to light, and was unable to complete the program, according to the lawsuit, which was settled out of court.

In recent years, court filings show, he collected a disability pension through the VA. He also drove a truck but quit in January 2025 due to health issues.

In March 2025, Brouillette passed the exam to become a real estate agent. His license was active until December. In a Facebook post, Realty of Maine announced that Brouillette will work out of the firm’s Bangor office.

“David lives in Maine after retiring from the United States Army,” said the post, which has since been deleted. Brouillette is no longer listed as a representative on the firm’s website. Messages seeking comment were left with Realty of Maine.

In March, Maine’s child support agency filed a lien against him, public records show.

The filing suggests Brouillette may have been in line for a permanent settlement or disability.

“I don’t think he considers himself a murderer”

In late 2025, around the time he joined ICE, his ex-wife Ashley said he left a three-minute voicemail in which he mocked her for taking out a warrant against him.

According to the report she shared with the AP, he repeatedly called her “disgusting” and suggested that she and other women and girls in her “bloodline” die.

“And all of you should have your throats slit,” the voicemail said.

“Yeah, you should. Threaten to do it? No. No. But I think you should get your throats cut? Or should you have them cut? Yeah.”

She said she cut contact with him until Wednesday, when his picture began circulating online.

Ashley Brouillette reached out to her now-wife on Facebook and they spoke on the phone for a few minutes.

Her ex-husband spoke to her, according to cellphone screenshots she shared with the AP. He admitted to fatally shooting Durán Guerrero.

“He asked if I could tell them he’s a good person and not talk about the abuse and the things I’ve been through with him, and he said the most important thing right now is his character,” she said.

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She said he told her he was now in protective custody.

“I asked him why he did it,” she said. “He said it was a justified shooting. The guy was trying to run him over with a car.”

His daughter also said he told her it was justified.

“I don’t think he considers himself a murderer,” Madison Brouillette said.

“I think he thinks he really did the right thing,” she added. “All he said was he did what he had to do. He said he had to protect himself.”