“Both the federal government and the state or county have the power to investigate as a predicate to possible prosecutions,” Robert Weisberg, Edwin E. Huddleson, Jr. professor of law, said in an interview with Stanford Law School. “There are logistical problems when both parties want to examine the same evidence, especially when there are time-sensitive concerns about preserving the evidence. These problems can be overcome by cooperation between the U.S. and the state to coordinate the investigations.”

“[I]n recent years in many states, the investigative power over local police has been handed to the state Attorney General on the theory that that office is more objective than local prosecutors,” Weisberg said. “So, the parallel on the federal side is that the investigation of ICE agents should be done by DOJ on the theory that it is independent and more objective than DHS in investigating its own agents.”

However, there has been heightened criticism around the DOJ acting as a non-independent agency.

“I need not tell you that there is a lot of skepticism out there about whether the DOJ will exercise any independent judgment here, especially after we have people in the White House and the U.S. Attorney General pre-judging these killings as thoroughly justified actions against so-called domestic terrorists,” Weisberg said.