Legal Insurrection by William A. Jacobson 9/8/2021
Charges Upgraded Against Minnesota Officer Who Accidentally Fired Gun Instead of Taser, Killing Daunte Wright
First Degree Manslaughter added by Attorney General Keith Ellison on top of previous Second Degree Manslaughter.In early April 2021, as the trial of Derek Chauvin was winding down, a police officer in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, shot dead Daunte Wright, leading to days of rioting and looting that became an issue in the Chauving trial as to potential juror bias.
The police officer, Kimberly Potter, asserted that the meant to pull out and fire her taser but mistakenly pulled out her service gun and fired bullets.
Video of the incident backed her up. After Wright, wanted on a warrant, broke loose while being handcuffed and got back in his car, she yelled a warning of “I’ll tase you” and “taser, taser, taser” and then reacted when she realized she fired her gun:
Nonetheless, the officer was charged with Second Degree Manslaughter. As Andrew Branca explained with respect to the Chauving trial:
… second-degree manslaughter requires that the defendant creates an unreasonable risk, and “consciously takes chances of causing death or great bodily harm.” If the state has not proven that the defendant intentionally engaged in conduct that had a reasonably foreseeable risk of causing death or great bodily harm, then the state has not proven the crime of second-degree manslaughter.
Both of these offenses require that the defendant engaged in conduct that was unreasonable, that created a foreseeable risk of deadly force harm, and that the defendant consciously incurred that risk or, alternatively, consciously disregarded that risk. If any of these conditions are not proven beyond a reasonable doubt, then the underlying crime has not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
In late May, the Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison took over the case.
The charges have just been upgraded by adding first degree manslaughter::
The former Minnesota police officer accused of fatally shooting Daunte Wright during a traffic stop is now facing a more serious charge in the Black man’s death, the state attorney general’s office said Thursday.
More:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/09/charges-upgraded-against-minnesota-officer-who-accidentally-fired-gun-instead-of-taser-killing-daunte-wright/
