Minneapolis agrees to ban use of chokeholds by police
Minneapolis agreed Friday to ban chokeholds by police and to require officers to try to stop any other officers they see using improper force, in the first concrete steps to remake the city’s police department since George Floyd’s death.
The changes are part of a stipulation between the city and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights, which launched a civil-rights investigation this week in response to the death of Floyd. The city council approved the agreement 12-0.
Human rights commissioner Rebecca Lucero said the changes are necessary to stop ongoing harm to people of colour “who have suffered generational pain and trauma as a result of systemic and institutional racism.”
“This is just a start,” Lucero said. “There is a lot more work to do here, and that work must and will be done with speed and community engagement.”
The agreement requires court approval and would become enforceable in court, unlike the department’s current policies on the use of force and duties to intervene. It would require officers to immediately report to their superiors when they see use of any neck restraint or chokehold.
Lucero said the changes go further than the department’s current policies. Any officer who doesn’t try to stop improper use of force would face the same discipline as if they themselves used improper force.
The agreement also would require authorization from the police chief or a deputy chief to use crowd-control weapons such as tear gas, rubber bullets and flash-bang grenades. Such tactics were used in Minneapolis and other cities in the past week to disperse protesters. Meanwhile, a man who was with Floyd on the night he died told the New York Times that his friend didn’t resist arrest and instead tried to defuse the situation before he ended up handcuffed on the ground and pleading for air.
Maurice Lester Hall, a longtime friend of Floyd’s, was a passenger in Floyd’s car when police approached him May 25 as they responded to a call about someone using a forged bill at a shop. Hall told the newspaper that Floyd was trying to show he was not resisting.
“I could hear him pleading, ‘Please, officer, what’s all this for?’” Hall told the Times.
Authorities say Hall is a key witness in the state’s investigation into the four officers who apprehended Floyd.
Hall told “Good Morning America” that the situation escalated quickly and police grabbed Floyd, put him in a squad car, dragged him back out and then “jumped on the back of the neck.”