The former police officer who shot Daunte Wright at a bus stop was sentenced to two years in prison. on Friday, far less than the standard seven years for manslaughter, after a judge said the leniency was justified because the officer intended to fire her stun gun, not her gun.
Jury condemned former officer, Kimberly Potter, on two counts of manslaughter in December. They discovered that she had acted recklessly when she fired a bullet into Mr. Wright’s chest, warning that she was going to stun him, and yelling “Taser! Taser!” Taser! Taser!
Ms. Potter, a 49-year-old white woman who served as a police officer in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, resigned two days after the April shooting, during chaotic protests over the killing of Mr. Wright, a 20-year-old black man. . She has been in detention since her conviction on 23 December.
Judge Regina M. Chu sentenced Ms. Potter only on the most serious count, first-degree manslaughter, under Minnesota law. The state’s sentencing guidelines state that the expected penalty for a felony is just over seven years in prison, although the maximum penalty is 15 years. Judge Chu said the case was very different from most manslaughter cases, as well as other high-profile police killings.
“This is not a police officer found guilty of murder for kneeling a man for nine and a half minutes while he was gasping for air,” the judge said, referring to Derek Chauvin, a Minneapolis officer who was convicted of killing George Floyd. She added, “This is a police officer who made a tragic mistake. She pulled out a firearm, thinking it was a stun gun, and ended up killing the young man.”
Judge Chu handed down the verdict shortly after Ms Potter sobbed while apologizing to Mr Wright’s family in court on Friday.
“I’m sorry I caused your son’s death,” said Miss Potter. Addressing Mr. Wright’s mother directly, she said, “Kathy, I understand motherly love and I’m sorry I broke your heart. My heart is broken for all of you.”
Mr. Wright’s relatives said they were outraged by the lenientness of the two-year sentence handed down to Ms. Potter.
Daunte Wright’s father, Arboui Wright, fought back tears as he described feeling betrayed and hurt. He said the judge seemed to care more about Ms. Potter than Mr. Wright and his family.
“They were so absorbed in her feelings and what was happening to her that they forgot about the murder of my son,” he said. “We actually thought we were going to get justice.”
Ben Crump, a lawyer representing Mr Wright’s family, said many people have been sentenced to longer prison terms for selling marijuana.
One of Ms. Potter’s lawyers, Paul Eng, said he was grateful that Ms. Potter was “showed mercy.”
It is rare that police officers are convicted and sentenced to prison for killing people. And prosecutions are unusual in the few situations in which officers have claimed to have thought they were firing stun guns.
In the 15 previous cases over the past two decades, when officers claimed to have mixed up their weapons, three were convicted of the crime, including the two officers who fired the fatal shots. Johannes Mehserle, the traffic officer who shot and killed Oscar Grant III at a train station in Oakland, California in 2009, was sentenced to two years in prison. Robert Bates, Volunteer Deputy Sheriff in Tulsa, Oklahoma sentenced to four years in prison after he shot a man, intending to fire a stun gun.
Prosecutors in the office of Keith Ellison, Attorney General of Minnesota, have proposed asking Judge Choo to sentence Ms. Potter to prison in excess of the standard sentence range of 6.2 to 8.6 years, but in a new court filing this week, they instead said that an offer within this range would be appropriate.
Ms. Potter’s lawyers asked the judge to sentence Ms. Potter to probation, arguing that she would be a “walking target” in prison and that the prosecution’s demand for a sentencing was a “political statement.”
Mr Eng said at Friday’s sentencing hearing that Ms Potter had experienced a “deterioration in mental and physical health” for almost two months, that she had been placed in solitary confinement for fear she would be attacked.
More on the murder of Daunte Wright
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Accusations. Miss Potter encountered two felony charges: first-degree manslaughter and second-degree manslaughter. None of the allegations suggested that she intended to kill Mr. Wright. Subsequently, she was sentenced to two years in prisonwhich is far less than the standard sentence of seven years for manslaughter.
Filming. When Mr. Wright escaped from the hands of another officer who was trying to handcuff him, Miss Potter shouted a warning: assuming she used her stun gunand fired a single shot, killing Mr. Wright.
Taser vs Pistol. How could Miss Potter, a 26-year veteran of the Force, to confuse a pistol with a taser? There were such cases, although not often. IN 15 other cases over the past 20 years, according to The Times, three officers have been convicted.
Mr. Wright’s parents and siblings asked Judge Chu to sentence Ms. Potter to the maximum possible prison term.
“Daunte meant the world to me,” Arboui Wright said in court before sentencing. “He was handsome, he was my son, he was my prince. Daunte was my reason. He was my reason to be a better person.”
China Whitaker, the mother of Daunte Wright’s two-year-old son Daunte Jr., said she became a single mother “not by choice but by force” and that Ms. Potter took Daunte Jr.’s “best friends away from him”.
It is likely that Ms. Potter will be released from prison in about 14 months, in April 2023. Under Minnesota law, prisoners are generally released under supervised release after two-thirds of their sentence, with Ms. Potter counting the 58 days she has spent in custody since her conviction.
Prosecutors in Ms Potter’s case admitted that the April 11 shooting was a mistake, and moments after she fired, body-camera footage showed her screaming that she had grabbed the wrong weapon and falling to the ground in tears.
Mr. Wright was driving with a friend to a car wash in suburban Minneapolis when Officer Anthony Luckey, who was trained by Ms. Potter, noticed that Mr. Wright was using the wrong turn signal. Officer Lucky followed Mr. Wright’s white Buick and noticed that an air freshener was hanging from the rearview mirror of the car. which is against the law in many statesand that his license plate had an expired registration sticker.
Officers checked Mr. Wright’s name in the police database and determined that a judge had recently issued a warrant for his arrest because he missed a trial date on charges of illegal possession of a weapon and running away from police officers. He got out of the car at the request of Officer Lucky, but when the officer tried to handcuff him, Mr. Wright wriggled out of his grip and got back behind the wheel.
As Officer Lucky wrestled with Mr. Wright, trying to keep him from leaving, Miss Potter yelled, “I’m groping you!” instead drawing a Glock issued by her department. Moments later, she fatally shot Mr. Wright, whose car soon drove down the street before crashing into an oncoming car.
Daunt Demetrius Wright played basketball in high school and later worked at Taco Bell and a shoe store with his father. His mother testified at Ms. Potter’s trial that Mr. Wright had recently entered vocational school and was about to become a carpenter.