April 11, 2021, Downtown Brooklyn near Minneapolis, Minnesota. The shooting of a black youth by police sparked protests. A crowd gathered to confront police as they lined up for investigators to search the scene. Some vandalized police cars and stood on them.
According to the Minneapolis-area police union, the city where the Floyd death occurred, the officer who shot and killed 20-year-old African-American man Daunte Wright was killed after riots and protests in the area. The police officer who shot and killed Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old African-American man, and the city’s police chief announced their resignations on Tuesday (April 13).
Kim Potter, a veteran Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, police officer, and Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon resigned, the police union announced.
In her brief letter, Potter wrote, “I have loved every minute of being a police officer and have served this community to the best of my ability. But I believe it would be in the best interest of the community, the police department and my fellow officers if I were to resign immediately.” The letter was issued by the state’s largest public safety union, Law Enforcement Labor Services.
Prior to this announcement, Gannon had told reporters on Monday (April 12) that he did not intend to resign.
Downtown Brooklyn Mayor Mike Elliott told a news conference Tuesday that officials had accepted the resignations of Porter and Gannon.
Elliott told reporters, “We received a letter of resignation from Officer Kim Porter, and in addition to that, we received a letter of resignation from the police chief.”
Gannon had previously said that Porter, who has served in the police department for 26 years, mistakenly shot Wright, 20. At the time, she mistook her handgun for a Taser stun gun (Taser).
Porter, a 48-year-old female officer, can be heard on the police officer’s body-worn camera recordings shouting, “Taser! Taser!”
Elliott said Tuesday, “Whenever someone kills another human being in the line of duty, they must be held accountable.”
The shooting death on Sunday (April 11) was followed by a massive local outbreak of protests, riots and looting. Protesters and mobs gathered near the city’s police headquarters. Video footage from the scene late Monday night and early Tuesday morning showed the mob throwing objects at police officers deployed behind a barbed wire fence.
Several businesses and businesses in the area were vandalized and looted during the demonstrations and protests, according to law enforcement officials.
The city is about 10 miles from Minneapolis, where the murder trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin is underway. Chauvin is charged in connection with the death of African-American man George floyd – an incident that sparked riots and protests across the United States last summer.
The Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association, a police union, issued a statement Tuesday saying “no conclusions should be made until the investigation is complete .”
Wright, the young black man who died, was identified by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office as having died from a gunshot wound to the chest. Porter, the officer who fired the shot, had previous experience investigating police shootings. According to a report from the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, Porter was one of the first officers to respond when police in Brooklyn Center shot and killed a man who allegedly tried to stab a police officer with a knife in August 2019.
Court records show Wright had a confrontation with Minneapolis police last June. He was charged with possession of a firearm without a permit, resisting police inspection and fleeing from arrest. He has not appeared in court since. Police bodycam records show that on this occasion when officers were checking Wright’s name and identification documents, they shouted, “He’s a wanted man.”
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