Officer resigns after shooting
Police chief also steps down as protests over the killing of Daunte Wright continue.
Minnesota policewoman and chief step down as protests continue over killing.
BROOKLYN CENTER, Minn. — A white Minnesota police officer who fatally shot a Black man during a traffic stop in a Minneapolis suburb and the city’s chief of police resigned Tuesday, moves that the mayor said he hoped would help heal the community and lead to reconciliation after two nights of protests and unrest.
The resignations from Officer Kim Potter and Police Chief Tim Gannon came two days after the death of 20-year-old Daunte Wright in Brooklyn Center. Potter, a 26-year veteran of the police force, had been on administrative leave after Sunday’s shooting, which happened as the Minneapolis area was already on edge over the trial of the first of four former police officers in George Floyd’s death.
Brooklyn Center Mayor Mike Elliott said at a news conference that the city had been moving toward firing Potter when she resigned. Elliott said that he hoped her resignation would “bring some calm to the community,” but that he would keep working toward “full accountability under the law.”
“We have to make sure that justice is served, justice is done,” Elliott said. “Daunte Wright deserves that, his family deserves that.”
A decision on whether prosecutors will charge Potter could come as soon as Wednesday. Meanwhile, the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul imposed 10 p.m. curfews. A Brooklyn Center city spokeswoman didn’t immediately respond to a message on whether the city would have a curfew.
More than 1,000 protesters gathered again Tuesday at Brooklyn Center’s police headquarters, now ringed by concrete barriers and a tall metal fence, and where police in riot gear and National Guard troops stood watch. “Murderapolis” was scrawled with black spray paint on a barrier. The group also marched to the Minneapolis office of the FBI, a couple of blocks away.
“Daunte Wright! Say his name!” the crowd chanted. “No justice, no peace! Prosecute the police!”
About 90 minutes before the curfew deadline, authorities announced over a loudspeaker that the gathering had been declared unlawful and ordered the crowds to disperse. That set off confrontations, with protesters shaking the fence and throwing objects at police, who responded with flashbang and gas grenades.
“You are hereby ordered to disperse,” the announcement said, warning that anyone not leaving would be arrested.
Gannon has said he believed Potter mistakenly grabbed her gun when she was going for her Taser. She can be heard on her body camera video shouting “Taser! Taser!” However, protesters and Wright’s family members say there’s no excuse for the shooting and it shows how the justice system is tilted against Black people, noting Wright was stopped for an expired car registration and ended up dead.
Activists who attended the mayor’s news conference called for sweeping changes to the Brooklyn Center Police Department and sharply criticized the acting police chief, Tony Gruenig, for not yet having a plan.
Elliott said the department has about 49 police officers, none of whom live in Brooklyn Center. He said that he didn’t have information on racial diversity at hand but that “we have very few people of color in our department.”
The modest suburb just north of Minneapolis has seen its demographics shift dramatically in recent years. In 2000, more than 70% of the city was white. Today, a majority of residents are Black, Asian or Latino.
Wright was stopped for having expired license plates. Police then tried to arrest him on an outstanding warrant after failing to appear in court on charges that he fled from officers and possessed a gun without a permit during an encounter with Minneapolis police in June.
Body-camera video released Monday shows Wright struggling with police when Potter shouts, “I’ll tase you! I’ll tase you! Taser! Taser! Taser!” She draws her weapon after the man breaks free from police outside his car and gets back behind the wheel.
After firing a single shot from her handgun, the car speeds away, and Potter says, “Holy [expletive]! I shot him.”
Wright died of a gunshot wound to the chest, according to the medical examiner.
Potter sent a one-paragraph letter of resignation.
“I have loved every minute of being a police officer and serving this community to the best of my ability, but I believe it is in the best interest of the community, the department, and my fellow officers if I resign immediately,” Potter wrote.
Wright’s father, Aubrey Wright, told ABC’s “Good Morning America” that he rejects the explanation that Potter mistook her gun for her Taser.
“I lost my son. He’s never coming back. I can’t accept that. A mistake? That doesn’t even sound right. This officer has been on the force for 26 years. I can’t accept that,” he said.
The Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Assn., the police union, issued a statement Tuesday saying, “No conclusions should be made until the investigation is complete.”
Prosecutors in Hennepin County, where the shooting occurred, said they have referred the case to nearby Washington County — a practice county attorneys in the region adopted last year in handling police deadly force cases. Washington County Atty. Pete Orput told WCCO-AM he had received information on the case from state investigators and hoped to have a charging decision Wednesday.
Elliott, the mayor, called for the governor to move the case to the state attorney general to prosecute.
John Stiles, spokesman for the attorney general’s office, said the attorney general has confidence in Orput’s review of the case.
Potter has experience with investigations into police shootings. She was the police union president and one of the first officers to respond after Brooklyn Center police fatally shot a man who allegedly tried to stab an officer with a knife in August 2019, according to a report from the Hennepin County attorney’s office.
After medics arrived, she told the two officers who shot the man to get into separate squad cars, turn off their body cameras and not to speak to each other. She accompanied two other officers while investigators interviewed them.