Death of a Motorist

"This was no oopsie, this not putting the wrong date on a check, this was not entering the wrong password, this was a colossal screw-up, a blunder of epic proportions, it was precisely the thing she was warned about for years, it was irreversible and it was fatal."

Prosecutor Erin Eldridge

 

"I could stop right here. Because if you presume, which you have to do, if you presume that she did not cause the death, which you have to have the presumption of innocence, did they prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she caused this death? No."

"Daunte Wright caused his own death, unfortunately. Those are the cold hard facts of the evidence." 

Potter’s attorney Earl Gray

 

"[The verdict] provided some measure of accountability for the senseless death of their son, brother, father and friend."

"From the unnecessary and overreaching tragic traffic stop to the shooting that took his life, that day will remain a traumatic one for this family and yet another example for America of why we desperately need change in policing, training and protocols."

Statement: Attorneys Benjamin Crump, Antonio Romanucci and Jeff Storms

A jury has found former Minnesota police officer Kim Potter guilty on two manslaughter charges in the death of Daunte Wright. Potter shot and killed the 20-year-old Wright during a traffic stop in suburban Minneapolis earlier this year.  Pool via Reuters

A 26-year veteran of the Minneapolis police force now faces the potential of 15 years in prison for the shooting death of yet another black man. The criminal and unintentional death of George Floyd in 2020 is still reverberating if not around the world, then in Minnesota. And it was no doubt the proximity in time and place with that outrage still seething in the trial of Derek Chauvin the former Minneapolis police officer charged in George Floyd's death that led to the guilty verdict in the trial of 49-year-old Kim Potter.

 

Young Black men earned a broad national reputation as a criminal underclass in the United States. Their presence in prisons over-representing their numbers in society as a reflection of their gang memberships propensity to crime and violence. A long history of racial discrimination may play a part in this penchant for black youth to lend themselves to petty crime, to violence and to a loathing for law enforcement whether or not American Blacks have proven themselves more than capable of matching their white peers in any profession.

The presence of black mayors and chiefs of police appears to have made little impression on the trajectory black youth so often take for their future in crime and nor did the event of a black president of their country, black magistrates, academics, journalists, health professionals all distinguishing themselves in pride of careers. Police still face an overwhelming black presence in crime and law enforcement. Even so, statistics appear to bear out that white criminals come to grief just as often as do blacks.

The temper of the times, with Black Lives Matter turning the tables on white 'supremacy' and the sordid history of racial discrimination, slavery and violence against blacks in America set the stage for this police officer's harsh jury judgement of guilt in the death of black motorist Daunte Wright during a traffic stop gone dreadfully wrong when it was discovered that the man stopped for a minor traffic infraction had failed to appear in court on a criminal charge.

Then-senior-officer Potter's body camera took footage of the encounter when she and two other officers pulled over the 20-year-old motorist at the traffic stop. When Daunte Wright resisted being handcuffed, a scuffle broke out and a melee ensued, with then-Officer Potter warning him repeatedly he would be tasered if he continued to resist arrest. In the heat of the scuffle she withdrew what was meant to be her stun gun, but which was her service revolver.

Calling, 'taser, taser, taser', she shot the resisting young man in the chest, killing him. She realized instantly what had occurred, and blurted out her belief that she would be held responsible for Daunte Wright's death, even while she declared it had been an accident. In the confusion of the struggle between the resisting man and the three police officers, an automatic action thought to be warranted under the tense situation went badly wrong.

Nothing could restore a man's life. And justice is not always the poultice to cover a sore. Extenuating circumstances often influence a judgement between deliberate action and involuntary error. Both prosecutors and defence attorneys were in agreement that Officer Potter had drawn the wrong weapon in error, with no intention whatever of doing harm to Daunte Wright, much less ending up being the instrument of his death.

Prosecutors insisted that the officer's prior 26 years of experience in law enforcement made it inexcusable that an error of this magnitude could occur. Charging her with deliberately taking a conscious, unreasonable risk using any weapon under the circumstances. These are predictable courtroom claims, easily made by those whose professions will never bring them to a violent, potentially dangerous encounter with a felon.

The officer's attorneys, for their part, placed the responsibility for the young man's death squarely on his own behaviour, resisting arrest and in so doing creating a fraught situation, justifying the use of force. Her decision to use a taser on an unruly man resisting arrest was not out of line in her professional conduct. A psychologist, Dr.Laurence Miller, testified about "action error" occurring when someone takes an unintended action, intending to act otherwise.

In their collective wisdom -- or in a reflection of the temper of the times in an overheated reaction to historical wrongs of black victimization -- the jury chose to make an example of a police officer whose judgement was called into question on the basis of a bad situation turning into an untenable, and truly unjustifiable loss of human life. Leaving Kimberley Potter guilty of first-degree and second-degree manslaughter in the death of Daunte Wright in Brooklyn Center, Minneapolis, April 11.

 

 

Identity Politics of Black Lives Matter

"Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) made a statement — while jurors in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin were not yet sequestered — which demanded street confrontations unless Chauvin were found guilty of murder. The trial judge correctly suggested that any conviction in the case might ultimately be thrown out on appeal, based on what Waters said. He condemned Waters' remarks in the strongest terms, but he did not have the courage to grant a defense motion for a mistrial. Had he done so, that almost certainly would have led to riots — which would have been blamed on the judge, not on Rep. Waters. So he left it to the court of appeals, months in the future, to grant a new trial -- which he should have granted."

Alan M. Dershowitz, Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Emeritus, Harvard Law School

Pictured: National Guardsmen and other law enforcement officers stand guard outside the Hennepin County Government Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where former police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted of murdering George Floyd, on April 20, 2021. (Photo by Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images)

Two things of a certainty: The former police officer Derek Chauvin of the Minneapolis Police, did, through his deliberate actions, take the life of a former felon, George Floyd, while attempting to arrest him for having passed a counterfeit $20 bill in the purchase of a pack of cigarettes. That Mr.Chauvin caused the death of Mr. Floyd is irrefutable. There are witnesses everywhere to the act, which was captured on video and repeatedly aired to great public dismay and anger. The man was in custody, had been subdued when he resisted arrest, and handcuffed in the prone position, and met his death when his oxygen supply was cut off.

 

Through the evidence of the video, more incriminating than any credible testimony, it was clear that Mr. Chauvin was the instrument of Mr. Floyd's death. There may well have been extenuating circumstances; Mr. Floyd was a drug user and had fentanyl in his system, and his health was compromised by a heart problem. Clearly, however, it was then-Officer Chauvin's knee pressed to Mr. Floyd's neck for over nine minutes of agony for Mr. Floyd who gasped for relief to enable him to breathe, that was the cause of  his death.

"They're a good family and they're calling for peace and tranquility, no matter what that verdict is."

"I'm praying the verdict is the right verdict, which is -- I think it's overwhelming in my view."

"I wouldn't say that unless the jury was sequestered now, [would] not hear me say that."

U.S.President Joe Biden, at the White House

Derek Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer, has been convicted on all charges in the death of George Floyd.   Pool

 

That would, of course, be viewed as the President of the United States interfering with the justice system had the jurors not been sequestered. It was obvious enough that he expressed the opinion that the jury of twelve women and men, black and white, needed to find the defendant guilty as charged. Some, like Professor Dershowitz, feel the state overstepped itself in declaring the death of George Floyd a murder and not a case of manslaughter. Murder is usually premeditated, while Mr. Floyd's death was a miscalculation and a heartless oblivion to his suffering.

 

This was a case fraught with danger for society in general and peace and stability in particular. Black Lives Matter adherents, passionate in their rage over past injustices against the black community in America see their purpose as forcefully reminding the majority white communities in the country of their past and current responsibilities in having enslaved a people, forcing their labour for profit, and over the course of the years manifestly believing in the inferiority of blacks while committing grave human rights crimes against them.

 

The BLM movement has been influential both in the U.S. and abroad for the outrage it invokes that is credible and deserving. But it, like the Minneapolis police officer who committed a black man to death in an age-old manner, has transgressed the boundaries of civil behaviour, committing serious offences of their own in the process. Posturing, threatening, and committing violence against others, both black and white, destroying public and private property, creating chaos in their wake. Defying law and order.

 

Many now view the finding of guilty in the criminal trial of Mr. Chauvin just and deserving. During the course of his professional duties, after all, he committed the cardinal sin of overstating his public duty and in the process of disabling a struggling man, applying continual undue force resulting in his tortured death. Now, Mr. Chauvin is the one in handcuffs and Mr. Floyd's memory as a handcuffed and subdued arrestee has filed the final chapter in the sad and sorry event that transformed a nation into a BLM-revenge-fearing country.

 

Chauvin pressed his knee into the back of Mr Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes.  EPA

 

Having pleaded not guilty to the charges of second-degree unintentional murder involving "intentional infliction of bodily harm", third-degree unintentional "depraved mind" murder involving an "act eminently dangerous to others", and second-degree manslaughter involving a death caused by "culpable negligence", former Minneapolis police officer Chauvin has been declared guilty on all counts. And now faces a likely prison sentence of at least ten years, as a first-time criminal offender. Longer, if "aggravating factors" are proven.

 

There were four police officers in total at that scene where George Floyd died. One, at least, was an ethnic minority. The three officers other than Mr. Chauvin were fired by the Minneapolis Police Department when Mr. Chauvin as the perpetrator of Mr. Floyd's death, was fired. All others are due to face trial as the year progresses on charges of aiding-and-abetting in Mr. Floyd's death. None appeared to have made an effort to intervene, to persuade Mr. Chauvin to release Mr. Floyd from the excruciating pain of impending death.  

There is another story here. The story of hardcore animosity between black and white. Guilt on the part of the white community, accusations that cannot be denied from the black community. And a deadly rage that promised to unleash mayhem and even murder along with looting and destruction should Mr. Chauvin not be found guilty. Witnesses who testified for Mr. Chauvin have received threats and a general aura of violent intimidation hung on the air in anticipation of a verdict that could not have been other than it was.

The reasons twofold; that guilt was indeed his, as the evidence clearly demonstrated, though the charges might have been different; and the fear of violence once again erupting on a scale that might dwarf those that were mounted last year in the wake of the death of Mr. Floyd would be repeated. And may yet still be. The BLM movement appears to be addicted to the rage of violence and defiance of the law which nothing seems to appease.

 

People gathered in Minneapolis to celebrate the verdict and pay tribute to George Floyd   Getty Images

Several signs in George Floyd Square in Minneapolis honored Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man who was fatally shot by a police officer this week.  Credit...Jenn Ackerman for The New York Times

April 13, 2021

"This appears to me, from what I viewed and the officers' reaction and distress immediately after, that this was an accidental discharge that resulted in the tragic death of Mr. Wright."

Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon

 

"I want to say that our hearts are aching right now."

We are in pain right now. And we recognize that this couldn't have happened at a worse time."

"We will get to the bottom of this. We will do all that is in our power to make sure that justice is done for Daunte Wright."

Brooklyn Park Mayor Mike Elliott 

"It is really a tragic thing that happened, but I think we've got to wait and see what the investigation shows."

"In the meantime, I want to make it clear again: There is absolutely no justification -- none -- for looting, no justification for violence."

"Peaceful protests: understandable."

U.S. President Joe Biden

April 14, 2021

"I'm hoping this will bring some calm to the community [resignation of Officer Kim Potter and Police Chief Tim Gannon]."

"We want to send a message to the community that we are taking this situation seriously."

Brooklyn Park Mayor Mike Elliott

"[We are calling for a] full and transparent investigation [following] yet another shooting of a Black man."

Former U.S. President Barack Obama, Michelle Obama

"My heart is broken in a thousand pieces. ... I miss him so much, and it's only been a day."

"He was my life, he was my son and I can never get that back."

"Because of a mistake? Because of an accident?"

Katie Wright, mother of Daunte Wright

15 April, 2021

"While we appreciate that the district attorney is pursuing justice for Daunte, no conviction can give the Wright family their loved one back."

]"This was no accident. This was an intentional, deliberate, and unlawful use of force."

"Driving while Black continues to result in a death sentence."

Attorney Benjamin Crump, Wright family representative

Officer Kim Potter submitted her resignation after the fatal shooting.

 

Tensions are high in the United States. A country where a  black was popularly voted in for two presidential terms of office. A country where increasingly police chiefs in numerous American cities are black, and where many cities in the nation have elected black mayors. Black politicians abound in Congress. Black CEOs of important corporations have made their way to the top of the business ladder. Black actors have amply demonstrated that they have the talent to star in motion pictures, the favourite entertainment medium of Americans. Black sport figures ably outperform their non-black counterparts.

In academia black professors rise to the apex of the academic world. Black physicians, researchers and health-care specialists distinguish themselves with their capacity to perform at a level comparable with any of their non-black peers. And yet. Blacks are over-represented in prisons, perpetrators of crime outdistancing their numbers in society. When Barack Obama worked in Chicago as a community organizer he was extremely careful at night to avoid encountering black thugs.

Black families live lives of privation in numbers greater than their white counterparts, and their presence in gangs and violence is comparatively larger than their equally-deprived white counterparts. Statistics indicate that, on the other hand, violent police interactions between black and white groups do not result in greater numbers of blacks being injured or killed than whites. 

While there is an undeniably shameful history of mistreatment and gross inhumanity perpetrated on a people brought from another continent to Europe, the Middle East and North America to serve as slaves and America's history is particularly damning in its treatment of its black population, white Americans of conscience have always deprecated the situation and fought with their black neighbours for justice.

Protesters marching toward the Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, police headquarters on Tuesday.

Stephen Maturen/Getty Images

 

Undeniably, there is a racist, bigoted and hateful undercurrent in society difficult to expunge, with people clinging to their discriminatory biases. There always has been, and likely always will be. It is an experience common to those demographics that are not Caucasian and considered inferior by the sociopathic racists in any society. The underbelly of black gangsterism, violence and criminality feeds into this racist swamp, just as blacks can claim that poverty and injustice drives them to the underworld.

A 20-year-old black man in a suburb of Minneapolis was the victim of what was claimed to be an "accidental discharge" by a veteran police officer, drawing her gun when she intended to bring out her Taser to subdue a man who was trying to physically overpower her intention to arrest him for a traffic violation; driving with an expired car registration. Wanted, additionally for arrest on a criminal charge. A traffic stop video demonstrated a struggle between the man and the female officer, recording her shouting, "Taser! Taser!", failing to stop him from driving off.

This incident occurring in the foreground of a trial of another police officer accused of deliberately murdering another black man, whose death reverberated globally and his name became a beacon of outrage against white-on-black violence with George Floyd becoming a symbol of all that was wrong in America. Causing an outflow of international sympathy, and massive protest marches that turned into violent events of looting, destroying private and public properties, issuing threats and brutally violent confrontations.

The very real fear of a repeat of the massive public displays of unleashed brutality in the name of protesting brutality spurred authorities not to respond by retaking public order and security but doing little in the face of unbridled rage and destruction, for fear of causing even worse mass violence to erupt. That yet another black man dying with a police officer accused of murder in the very place where the original trial is taking place warns authorities yet again that more chaos is in the offing unless they bow to popular misconceptions and misconstructions.

There must be those who fall on their swords in recompense whether or not they followed the letter of the law. The latest death, of a man whom the police realized had an outstanding warrant for his arrest, who chose to grapple with them rather than submit to arrest, has all the hallmarks in the reaction of related authorities of submission to the rage of the mob. The town's mayor chose not to accept officer Potter's resignation, in favour of symbolically firing her. And out with the police chief who rationalized the event.

Leading to Minnesota authorities arresting the now-former police officer, a 26-year-veteran who knows intimately what violence and threats lead to, and struggled to defend herself according to her training and her gut reaction. She is to be charged with second-degree manslaughter, taken into custody, and booked in jail for the fatal shooting of Daunte Wright. The prosecution must now prove Kim Potter, in her duty as a police officer was "culpably negligent", taking an "unreasonable risk" in action against Wright.

Convicted, the charge carries a maximum sentence of ten years in prison along with a $20,000 fine. The punishment trial of Derek Chauvin, taking place mere miles away, the former Minneapolis police officer charged with the murder of George Floyd a year ago offers ample examples of how this new trial will eventually proceed. In each of these cases, the black men whose lives were so tragically ended, were not male criminal ingenues; they had backgrounds of crime.

Being black and criminally-involved does not equate with death-as-just-desserts. But the very fact that blacks are given to criminal action, and blacks happen to murder other blacks at a rate far greater than blacks die at the hands of whites is a fact of life. One cannot hold life cheaply in some circumstances and dearly in others. And the human toll of distrust and anger between black and white leaves each in fear of facing death at the hands of the other.

In this very particular instance, the current president's statement calling for justice and for calm in arriving at that point, is far more reasonable than the one issued by his predecessor, but in this climate of black-lives-matter reason has little influence over passion.

"The key issue is whether somebody acted reasonably under the circumstances, whether they created this risk of harm."

"The state of mind of the officer is at the core of what we ask the jury to decide. In this case we’re really talking about: Is the accidental shooting forgivable or not?"

Steven Wright,  associate professor, University of Wisconsin Law School

79 people arrested following demonstration for Daunte Wright   
A citywide curfew went into effect in Brooklyn Center at 10 p.m., and some of those arrested were charged with unlawful assembly and inciting a riot.  Credit: CNN