Tags
Benjamin Crump, Curt Boganey, Duante Wright, George Floyd, Glock, Keith Ellison, Ken Buck, Kim Potter, Rashida Tlaib, social justice martyr, Taser, Ted Cruz, Tim Elliott, Tim Gannon
Note: Due to obligations, I’m posting this, Friday’s article, a day early.
Police officers often start out of a troubled sleep, only to awaken drenched in sweat, their hearts pounding out of their chests,glancing wildly about in a panic. One of worst nightmares of that kind, something that haunts every competent cop, is accidentally shooting someone who should not have been shot. Such is the reality of former Brooklyn Center, MN police officer, a 26-year female veteran, Kim Potter. Fox News reports:
Potter, 48, is accused of fatally shooting Daunte Wright. Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon described the shooting as ‘an accidental discharge,’ and said she had meant to fire a Taser, not a handgun.
‘I’ll Tase you! I’ll Tase you! Taser! Taser! Taser!” the officer is heard shouting on her bodycam footage released at a news conference. 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 the officer is heard saying, ‘Holy [shit]! I shot him.’
I could hear the horror and shock in her voice as she said that, and remembered all those sweat soaked nights.
The Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office said in a statement that Wright died of a gunshot wound to the chest ‘and manner of death is homicide.’ [skip]
She is reportedly married, with two adult sons, and lives with her husband – who is also a police officer – in another Minneapolis suburb.
It remains unclear whether Potter has retained a lawyer [she has] who could speak on her behalf. Gannon said earlier that she had been placed on administrative leave.
From the moment of his death, the media has labored to portray Wright as a virtual saint, and of course, as another social justice martyr, brutally and purposely murdered because he was black. Fox again:
Wright’s father, Aubrey, told the Washington Post that his son had just asked his mom for $50 for a carwash and was headed there when he was shot.
‘I know my son. He was scared. He still [had] the mind of a 17-year-old because we babied him,’ Wright told the outlet. ‘If he was resisting an arrest, you could Tase him. I don’t understand it.’
Aubrey said Daunte had a 2-year-old son and dropped out of high school two years ago because of a learning disability. Daunte has since worked in retail and fast-food restaurants to support his son and planned to get his GED, Aubrey told The Post.
‘He was a great kid,’ Aubrey Wright said. ‘He was a normal kid. He was never in serious trouble. He enjoyed spending time with his 2-year-old son. He loved his son.’
All people of good will pray for the comfort of Wright’s parents. His death is—absent additional information to the contrary—a tragic accident. However, Wright was anything but “a great kid,” and he was indeed in serious trouble, as I’ll explain shortly.
Being placed on administrative leave is normal procedure in such matters, and Potter resigned within hours, and so did Police Chief Tim Gannon. Potter surely resigned for tactical, legal reasons, and to spare her fellow officers as much grief as possible. Her family has been forced to abandon their home after its address was leaked, and are in hiding. Gannon resigned because he knew he was going to be fired:
In addition to Potter, Brooklyn Center Mayor Mike Elliott announced that Police Chief Tim Gannon resigned as well.
The mayor said the new police leadership was committed to working with community leaders and protesters, who say Wright was racially profiled.
‘We’re hoping that we’re turning over a new leaf now,” he said. “I’m confident of that now.’
He shouldn’t be. Chief Gannon did his best to prevent the rioting and looting that continues as this is written. At a news conference, reporters were desperate to portray the rioting and looting as the usual “peaceful protests.” Gannon didn’t play along, which surely put him in local politician’s sights:
The media behaved as we have come to expect:
‘Just so everybody is clear, I was front and center at the protest, at the riot,’ Gannon said.
Before he could continue the press conference, Gannon faced disputes from multiple reporters who took issue with his use of the word ‘riot’ and demanded that he stop using it.
‘It was not a riot,’ one reporter shot back.
‘There was no riot,’ another reporter warned, joined by other members of the press who said, ‘don’t do that.’
Gannon quickly shut down the allegation from the media by explaining that multiple officers were ‘putting themselves in harm’s way’ as objects rained down on them.
In the current political climate, particularly in Minnesota, that was more than enough to doom Gannon. But Gannon wasn’t the only local official doomed by telling the truth:
From Fox News:
‘All employees working for the city of Brooklyn Center are entitled to due process with respect to discipline,’ [soon to be fired City Manager Curt] Boganey said. ‘This employee [Potter, whose identity had not been revealed at that point] will receive due process and that’s really all that I can say today.’
When pressed on whether he personally felt the officer should be fired, Boganey again called for due process.
‘If I were to answer that question, I’d be contradicting what I said a moment ago — which is to say that all employees are entitled to due process and after that due process, discipline will be determined,’ Boganey said. ‘If I were to say anything else, I would actually be contradicting the idea of due process.’
But Mayor Mike Elliot disagreed saying that he thought the officer should be immediately fired. But because of the nature of the construct of their system, the decision on personnel fell to the city manager.
So Elliott relieved him of his duties and the city council voted to fire him during an emergency meeting. They also gave the mayor command authority over the police department.
Boganey and Elliot are both Black, which in a sane, color-blind society shouldn’t matter, but people like Elliott and Governor Tim Walz, make it matter. Boganey made the mistake of daring to uphold the rule of law in a color-blind manner—Kim Potter is white. For BLM activists and sympathizers, this is unforgivable, so he had to go. Elliott is a Democrat, and the city council is Democrat dominated.
Who was Daunte Wright? Was he the saintly martyr the media would have us believe? Was he just like any other American youngster? Leave it to the Daily Mail, a British newspaper, rather than any US media propaganda organ, to provide the facts:
Daunte Wright choked a woman and threatened to shoot her if she did not hand over $820 she had stuffed in her bra, court papers obtained by DailyMail.com allege.
That is the case that led to a [felony] warrant for his arrest at the time he was shot and killed by police officer Kimberly Potter in Minnesota on Sunday, leading to days of unrest.
Wright was due to face trial on a charge of attempted aggravated robbery – with a possible maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
Wright’s bail was originally set at $100,000 with orders that he should not contact the victim or any witnesses, refrain from drugs and alcohol and not have any weapons. A bond bailsman paid $40,000 for his release.
But his bail was revoked in July last year due to his ‘failure to not possess a firearm or ammunition’ and not keeping in touch with his probation officer, court papers show.
At that time a judge issued a warrant for his arrest, that was still outstanding on the day he died.
There is more, much more:
That’s not all that appears on Wright’s record. There was the February arrest for aggravated robbery. There was a disorderly conduct charge arising from a 2019 incident. There was the guilty plea in late 2019 to possession and sale of marijuana.
With that much of his record exposed, I’m sure there were many more misdemeanor arrests and convictions about which we’re unlikely to learn. Clearly, Wright was a drug user and dealer, gangster/thug practitioner, and a violent criminal on his way to prison—or worse.
And of course, Attorney Benjamin Crump, who turns up whenever a black man is killed by the police or anyone else, knowing he’ll just have to race bait a bit and will be given an outlandish settlement by Democrat politicians only too glad to turn over millions of taxpayer dollars regardless of the facts, is already representing Wright’s parents, claiming Wright’s accidental death was a premeditated, racist murder. There are few people more despicable than Crump in the practice of American law, though to be fair, he practices social justice, not actual justice. It takes little legal talent to do that, and the rewards for little actual work are great. There is no doubt Brooklyn Center is going to be forking over millions without any resistance. The only question is how much and when?
Final Thoughts:
As usual, I’m working only with media reports. I’ve seen the released body camera video, and equally as usual, if I’m wrong in any particular, I’ll promptly correct any errors. That said, here’s what we reasonable know and can infer:
Unlike what Wright’s parents, with media help, have claimed, Wright was not stopped because he had an air freshener dangling from his rear view mirror, though under Minnesota law, that would have been a legitimate reason for a traffic stop. His license plates were expired.
It is highly unlikely the officers knew he was black until they were close enough to the driver’s door window to actually see him. This is the case in almost all traffic stops. There is no evidence—at all—of racial profiling or racism in this tragic accident.
Some media accounts have suggested Potter was acting as a field training officer that day, which explains the actions of the young, Black police officer who apparently made the initial approach—he was likely driving and made the decision to stop Wright–and seemed not only unable to handcuff Wright, who at the moment, wasn’t actively resisting, but seemed entirely unsure what to do when Wright violently pulled free and leapt into the driver’s seat of his vehicle.
Potter seemed unnerved by what was happening. It would not have been unreasonable for her to have feared Wright reentered the car to get to a weapon. The video is sufficiently shaky and unclear that it’s not possible to see exactly what Potter saw and could reasonably have believed. It also appeared she might have been concerned for the safety of her young trainee, who continued to have no idea what he was doing.
From Potter’s commands and actions, there seems little doubt she thought she was holding a Taser rather than her Glock. Some are suggesting since the two weapons are different in size and configuration, she should have known she was not holding the Taser merely by feel, but that’s an easy observation to make from the comfort of an armchair. In real, potential dangerous confrontations, that kind of mistake is indeed possible, and just that sort of thing has happened in the past to other police officers.
Sadly, had Potter been accompanied by an experienced officer, he might have been able to see what she was doing and prevent the tragedy.
It is not “blaming the victim” to observe Wright would almost surely be alive today if he were not a drug using and dealing criminal and submitted to the entirely lawful arrest. There is no doubt he knew of the warrant, and the potential jail sentence, which is surely why he attempted to flee. In so doing, he endangered the girl in his vehicle, who did suffer reportedly minor injuries, and every other driver on the road that day.
And of course, D/S/C politicians–Tlaib is only one of a crowd–had to do additional damage to America, though more rational people didn’t let them get away with it:
This response to Tlaib is particularly appropriate:
It’s rather easy to demand Normal Americans be deprived of police protection while you’re trying to disarm them behind scores of armed police, disarmed soldiers, barriers and fences. Of course, anti-American ideologues cannot be deterred:
This kind of rhetoric, and D/S/C politicians allowing BLM and Antifa to ravage their cities, also produces this kind of dangerous and destructive consequence:
Who in their right mind with the intelligence, qualifications and temperament is going to want to be a police officer in the future? It doesn’t take psychic powers to predict a mass police exodus from Brooklyn Center in the very near future.
Kim Potter, who by all accounts is a solid, dedicated, career police officer, has already been arrested. Mayor Elliott has also already asked Governor Walz to take the prosecution of Potter away from the local prosecutor and give it to racist Attorney General Keith Ellison, whose office, with the help of a variety of leftist law firms, is persecuting former Minneapolis Officer Derek Chauvin in the George Floyd case.
All of this is reason for concern because it is simply not possible for the BCA to have completed a competent investigation in the very short time elapsed. Once again, we have a white police officer treated very differently, due process arguably denied, because the “victim” was Black.
Without doubt, Duante Wright should not have been shot, but this was obviously a tragic accident, and under these circumstances, it would not have mattered if Wright were white or any other race. His actions, his choices, in the past and in that moment, put him in danger.
Indeed, have pity on his parents and those that, despite his obvious character flaws, loved him. Pray for his soul and for the comfort of his loved ones. But pray too, and have sympathy, for Kim Potter, her husband and sons. Her worst nightmare has happened. In an instant, a lifetime of service has been wiped away. We can be certain Ellison’s persecutors will be out for blood, and if Potter is not imprisoned for many years, it will be a miracle.
Keep in mind, gentle readers, that prison, for police officers, is a death sentence, and even more so these days.
Kim Potter’s life is essentially over, forever changed by the unintentional mistake of a moment. Every police officer, if they have any introspection, knows that is always possible. We should keep in mind, despite the ravings of corrupt politicians and equally corrupt media propagandists, that police officers have millions of contacts with citizens every year, and only a tiny portion of those contacts end in violence. We should also keep in mind the idea that police are killing large numbers of black men, particularly “unarmed” black men, is a blatant, easily disproved lie.
Kim Potter will face justice. Let us ensure it is not social justice, for in a just system, her quarter century plus of honorable service must mitigate her sentence. While any life unnecessarily lost is tragic, Duante Wright was not an innocent, and in considering a truly just sentence, that has to matter. We can be reasonably certain no one, no system, can punish Kim Potter more severely than she is punishing herself. Any police officer making that kind of mistake loses their career, and they must face the consequences. Let us also pray she is not forced into prison, where her sentence will surely be death. That, surely, would not be just. That, surely, would compound a tragedy.
Elmer Fudd said:
The manufacturers have been far to successful at making Tasers look and feel like pistols. The difference should be instinctually, tactiley obvious.
How could that testosterone deficient, flat toothed, grass eating castrati sire a child?
Mike McDaniel said:
Dear Elmer Fudd:
Actually, most police Tasers are bright yellow, the grips significantly smaller than handgun grips. That’s not the issue. Under stress, people do odd things, even experienced people.
SPD3454 said:
Dear Mike,
I usually agree with you, but your response to Elmer Fudd, I have to disagree. Actually the current, most popular taser is the Axon X2, is black. The older style X26 was yellow, but those were fazed out a few years ago. The newest taser to market is the Taser 7, which once again is in yellow. The X26 doesn’t feel like a handgun, as the grip is very small, but on the other hand, the X2 feels like a handgun. Its much larger and the grip is larger. The main problem is LE training. Before I was promoted to administration last year, our officers were issued a taser, given a few minute training and then fired 1 cartridge at a piece of plywood. That was it. The department was failing to train our officers. The reason we were given was that the cartridges cost to much. That has changed with the new administration, who requires quarterly training with tasers during DT and Firearms training. I really appreciate the rest of the article. I also believe she was a FTO. I do believe she was observing the officer, since there was another officer on the passenger side. I think she was a little stressed and just grabbed the wrong weapon. I think she was stressed enough the muscle memory kicked in. I would really like to understand also where she has been assigned in the department and how long she has been working the road. I look at my career so far and I was on the street before tasers, go to investigations and we buy tasers, and then come back to street supervisor with a taser. It was a large learning curve for a seasoned officer to get use to the taser. I’m old school and until being promoted again, I still carried the PR24, everyday. Thanks for reading my rant.
Elmer Fudd said:
Great rant.
The PR24 was effective and almost never lethal but it looked ugly when caught on video. The Taser seems far more humane but actually had more potential to cause death, especially on people with cardiac issues.
An even worse problem is impact munitions, specially for 12 gauge shotguns. To many officers are allowed to employ those weapons without any clue of how and why they function much less the minimum distance at which they can be employed with minimal risk. Few departments understand that the “beanbags” will not expand reliably unless fired from a rifled barrel and require at least 30 feet to complete expansion. The Portland Police Bureau had an incident where an officer carried buckshot “just in case.”. He accidentally loaded the wrong ammunition at the beginning of shift. The result was a nearly dead and permanently disabled mentally disturbed person who IMHO had done nothing to justify use of potentially lethal force.
An even greater embarrassment for the Portland Police Bureau was the shooting of a 12 year old girl with beanbag rounds. The excuse was that she was a very large 12 year old girl and the police were getting their asses kicked. The reality was that she was already down on the ground with hands behind her back when officer friendly decided that she deserved the application of pain compliance therapy. All of this was caught on video as well as observed by creditable witnesses.
The Feds also came close to killing one of the “peaceful protestors” who was actually being peaceful (there were other peaceful protestors who needed shooting because they were arsonists) by shooting him with a 12 gauge shotgun. There was and remains confusion over the ammo. Was it a less lethal impact munition or a tear gas round? The kid who was merely playing some loud music got his skull caved in.
The bottom line is that these types of less lethal weapon need to be designed so that they can not fire commonly available lethal ammunition. A custom built 8 gauge shotgun that functions only with less lethal ammunition would avoid these problems. Larger bore diameter also enables the delivery of energy over a wider frontal area to reduce risk.
Mike McDaniel said:
Dear Elmer Fudd:
The problem is we’re talking about “less lethal,” not “non-lethal” methods. Even devices and techniques that are non-lethal on 99.9% of the population are going to kill .1%, and some hapless cop is going to blunder into them. The incidents you’ve described are also very much training issues. Unless one works with technology so often its use does not require conscious thought, there are going to be mistakes, and so much of police training is “once and done.”
As I’ve often observed, considering the sheer number of police contacts, it’s amazing the police have so few problems and make so few serious mistakes.
Unfortunately, in D/S/C ruled cities, politicians are so anti-police and anti-America, use of force ROEs have gone so far left, crime is paying, individually, and in destroying the nation. I suspect it’s going to get much worse in those places, and doubt it will ever get better.
Mike McDaniel said:
Dear SPD3454:
I appreciate your perspective. While I’m experienced, it’s not recent experience. I’m old school too. I never carried a Taser, and so I rely on people I know who have, do, and Taser’s marketing. No doubt you’re correct about the X2, etc. I have fired one, the X26, but that was only two “shots,” which gave me an appreciation of its range and employment limitations.
As you say, training is always a major issue. I’m pretty sure she was an FTO. Her body cam perspective is what one would expect of an FTO observing a trainee.
Thanks for ranting!
Doug said:
I am understanding that Potter’s utility belt had the Taser on her left side and the Glock on the right… the Taser positioned for a cross-draw with the right hand. Kinda makes it yet more curious how such a specific movement to draw the Taser didn’t serve to trigger her mind how much easier it was to draw the Glock.
There are some other curiosities… one being that why didn’t the police have the young man turn off the engine when he was pulled over as I understand that’s procedure in any stop? In the least that would be a safety action to assure police and/or bystanders wouldn’t be placed in jeopardy if the car lurched forward, accidentally or intentionally.
That would have kept the young man from driving off so easily after being shot.
I have been reading in various sources online with all kinds of information on what were Duante Wright’s past and present legal issues. The last source was from Newsweek where they reported Wright had an outstanding warrant….
https://www.newsweek.com/fact-check-daunte-wright-arrest-warrant-1583535
“No warrants were issued for Wright in the aggravated robbery case, according to court records.
The warrant was related to a separate case—27-CR-21-4400—in which Wright was charged with carrying a pistol without a permit and fleeing a peace officer.
Court records show a judge signed a gross misdemeanor warrant for Wright’s arrest on April 2 after he missed the 2.30 p.m. Zoom hearing.”
Given all the various interpretations of what warrants Wright had outstanding and for what reasons… I’ve cited the above source “as a possible fact” until an investigation suggests otherwise.
All-in-all I personally see nothing racial in this tragedy but the timing of all this absolutely sucks given the current social outcry of alleged police abuse toward blacks and the current trial in the same county. A tragic accident in which the Wright family will suffer the loss of a loved one, and Potter will suffer the guilt of having taken a life due to a careless lack of attention… and subsequent career-ending with possible jail time.
Mike, you noted….
“His actions, his choices, in the past and in that moment, put him in danger.”
I have to ask… what/who was the danger to him? Would you be suggesting that the police would be his “danger”? Are you suggesting that if you commit a crime that the police will be a danger to you? No question that Wright’s criminal past contributed to the event that unfolded leading to his accidental death… but we don’t quite know yet to what degree that alone influenced events. Yet what you noted is the point that the Virginia Army officer expressed to the police, with guns drawn and pointed at him, demanding he exit his vehicle. “I’m afraid to come out.” The days are gone when the public respects the badge alone… it’s the gun everyone fears, and the unknown of the person carrying it.
Mike McDaniel said:
Dear Doug:
Speaking as a former Field Training Officer, it’s likely Potter was allowing her trainee to do what he could, stepping in when necessary, which is what FTOs do. Unfortunately, things went to hell in a hurry, as the can from time to time. I’ve heard the “cross draw” positioning of the Taser as well, but as so much else in this case, we can’t be sure. But if that were true, inexplicable things happen under stress, even to experienced people.
Yes, when people commit crimes, they’re in danger, not only from the police, but from their victims, other criminals–there really is no honor among thieves–and form the police. Police officers are empowered–by us–to use whatever force is reasonably necessary to make an arrest. Ultimately, people obey the police because of the threat of punishment, enforced by the threat of lawfully sanctioned violence. We pay and empower them so we don’t have to do it. And of course, the law protects criminals from us as much as it protects us from them. Absent the police, citizen solutions to crime will tend to be rather…final, and not subject to appeal.
Doug said:
You realize what you replied in your second paragraph rather sums up the concept brewing about re-thinking policing. You are suggesting the end justifies the means.. or more like.. ye reap what ye sow… some kind of Judge Dredd-lite mentality. You stated it yourself…
“Unfortunately, things went to hell in a hurry, as they can from time to time.”
Of course, absolutely they can because cops are human in spite of all this “empowerment” we bestow upon them. I’ve said it before, we expect cops to make no mistakes… because cop mistakes cause unintended deaths. It seems rather apparent that in some situations the vigor in carrying out an arrest doesn’t really fit the alleged reason for the arrest warrant.
Here’s to my greater point, Mike… no question at all in my mind that those who serve as cops are doing the job at great risk each and every day and the public good is served with a measure of courage and valor. I contend that maybe we… society… need to re-evaluate to what extent we actually want our police exposed to these consistent threats to their personal safety, expecting them to be perfect all the time. People “fear” the police because of what “might” happen… all given the stress of the job on the cop himself/herself.
Freddie said:
Absolutely agree with Doug’s intimation. Because we
should not want our cops exposed to “consistent threats
to their personal safety,” the cops need to stand down.
I may be misreading Doug–just shoot and ask questions later
(but I don’t like that)–, but let’s seriously think about letting
public advocates or community organizers deal with the
obviously dangerous situations, or what might turn out to
be dangerous situations, and let the cops do parking tickets.
Cops with guns are a threat to my business. I’d rather have
a community organizer on my turf than an armed cop.
Freddie
Mike McDaniel said:
Dear Freddie:
I can only hope you’re being satiric…
Doug said:
Yeah.. you are pretty much missing Doug’s intimation… more or less completely presuming the extreme.
Foggytrucker said:
Once driving in Connecticut I noticed a local police car following me. I wondered why, but he just followed – until I turned onto the entrance ramp of the interstate when he turned on his lights, As I pulled over, a state trooper drove across the grass, blocked the ramp, got out and pointed his shotgun over the hood at us.
My companion stuck his hands up. (shotguns do look like the Holland tunnel if you’re looking at the business end) Having an open window I stuck my hands out it and yelled “I don’t know what you think I did, but there’s no need for a gun. Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it.” They informed me they wanted me to get out and put my hands on the fender. I didn’t want to, but I really didn’t want to tick off someone who had a shotgun pointed at me, so I did it. I was frisked, my companion was frisked, but I was never handcuffed because by then the cops were thinking they had the wrong men.
Which they did. Turns out there’d been a sexual assault and kidnapping by a long haired young man driving a brown Plymouth coupe. I was a long haired young man driving a brown Plymouth coupe, and in short order we were on our way. We were glad to see the cops trying to catch a violent pervert and understood their mistake.
I tell this story to point out the one common thread in all these celebrated incidents – resisting arrest. I find it very hard to believe that if George Floyd or Duante Wright had done so there ever would’ve been an incident. I’m also sure that if I’d made a sudden move or tried to drive out that the state trooper would’ve shot me. And I would’ve deserved it. Instead of making cops out to be the bad guys all the time, we should publicize the absolute stupidity of resisting arrest, not only is it dangerous but it understandably convinces the cops that you are guilty.
Doug said:
I would dispute… that NOTHING should convince any cop that a suspect is guilty unless determined by a court of law. Absolutely the cop can perceive a greater safety threat is eminent to self or the public. I should also suggest… the general public has NO idea how their personal body movements will be interpreted by police aiming weapons at you. In your instance, that could have gone very badly for you that in your attempt to comply fully you scratched your nose or pulled up on your belt to your pants when leaving the vehicle and the threat that might have suggested to the officers. Good real life example, by the way. Glad you made it past all that. :)
ontoiran said:
the moral of all of these stories for me is if you’re a cop and you just HAVE to kill somebody; kill a white. like the coward that shot Ashli Babbitt. there won’t be any consequences for you and there won’t be any nasty kerfuffle in the community, the press, or among our “leadership”
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