Officers slashed tires amid Minneapolis protests
The (Minneapolis) Star Tribune
MINNEAPOLIS — Two law enforcement agencies acknowledged Monday officers patrolling Minneapolis during the height of recent protests knifed the tires of parked unoccupied vehicles in at least two locations.
Video and photo images posted on news outlet Mother Jones show officers in military-style uniforms puncturing tires in the parking lot of a Minneapolis Kmart May 30.
Images also showed officers with knives deflating the tires of two unoccupied cars with repeated jabs May 31. Department of Public Safety spokesman Bruce Gordon confirmed that tires were cut in “a few locations.”
“State Patrol troopers strategically deflated tires … in order to stop behaviors such as vehicles driving dangerously and at high speeds in and around protesters and law enforcement,” he said.
Mr. Gordon said the patrol also targeted vehicles “that contained items used to cause harm during violent protests” such as rocks, concrete and sticks.
“While not a typical tactic, vehicles were being used as dangerous weapons and inhibited our ability to clear areas and keep areas safe where violent protests were occurring,” he said. “As in all operations of this size, there will be a review about how these decisions were made.”
Deputies from Anoka County followed state orders and joined the patrol and also cut the tires on some vehicles, said Anoka County Sheriff’s Lt. Andy Knotz.
Lt. Knotz followed directions from the state-led MultiAgency Command Center, which was coordinating law enforcement during the protests, which were sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd while in police custody.
Val Ebertz, who was at the protests, witnessed police slashing tires in the Kmart parking lot and said they were the same officers who “were tear-gassing and shooting us with rubber bullets to try to push us farther back into the Kmart parking lot.”
Kyla Cook was with Ms. Ebertz and said “all of us were in shock” when she and others in the Kmart lot saw one member from a line of officers in riot gear knife the tires of an unattended pickup truck.