The city of Minneapolis doesn’t own or use razor wire, yet it still wraps around the former Third Precinct police station.

“Most public-facing agencies don’t use razor wire,” City Operations Officer Margaret Anderson Kelliher  said. “It’s very unsafe. It’s meant to be a real barrier and could cause some real harm both to the people putting it up and people if they came over it.” 

The razor wire securing the badly damaged Third Precinct building is a remnant left by the National Guard, which came into the city following the civil unrest that broke out after the murder of George Floyd. It’s also become a backdrop in the 2024 campaign as Republicans portray it as a symbol of the mayhem they blame on Minnesota governor and vice presidential candidate Tim Walz.

During the unrest after Floyd’s murder, the Guard placed barbed coils around most city police precincts, Anderson Kelliher said. In most cases, it has been removed since. 

Meanwhile, remediation efforts at the former Third Precinct building in south Minneapolis began this spring. So why hasn’t the exterior changed over the last several months? 

When city staff set out to clean up the site, making the interior of the building safe was their first priority, Anderson Kelliher said. The idea was that the exterior barriers to the building could come down completely once the interior was safe and secure. 

But there were delays in finding qualified vendors from the city’s target market list to do smoke remediation work. Two firms eventually responded to the bid, but it was eventually determined that they could not do the work. There also were delays in obtaining custom glass and extruded steel needed for the building’s doorways and window frames.

Meanwhile, the razor wire, j-barrier and fencing around the property has become political fodder for Republican politicians. Earlier this month, former President Donald Trump’s vice presidential running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance, used the site for an appearance to paint Minneapolis as a dangerous place to live. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson also used the site as a backdrop for an August news conference.

Last week, just days after Vance appeared in front of the precinct, the City Council voted 8-3 to approve a resolution for the “immediate cleanup, remediation, and beautification of the 3000 Minnehaha site including but not limited to the removal of fencing, jersey barriers, barbed wire, and all other exterior blight.”

This cleanup was already happening, Anderson Kelliher noted. But with the council’s action, the city operations office will now change its order of operations. Within the next two weeks, the razor wire, J barriers and fencing will come down, she said. 

However, it will not look completely remediated after this phase, Anderson Kelliher noted. The razor wire will be replaced by construction fencing that will be pushed back closer to the building. This is a “compromise solution,” she said, as the city is not yet able to fully remove all the exterior barriers until the interior of the building can be fully secured. 

The goal of the next two weeks is to make it look more like a construction site and “less of what it’s looked like for the last four-plus years,” she said. 

Anderson Kelliher said the action did not come in response to the Vance visit. 

“It’s more that we are listening to our elected policy makers here and the community about how that razor wire, j-barrier and fencing feels, and really trying to find a solution that’s going to be more welcoming,” she said. 

Another angle on Lake Street 

If JD Vance had turned the cameras to look down Lake Street, the shot would have captured the recently remodeled and reopened century-old Coliseum Building at the corner of East Lake Street and 27th Ave. S. The 85,000-square-foot, mixed-use building reopened after a $28 million rehab. The project looks to make the location a hub for people-of-color-owned businesses. 

Chris Montana, co-owner of the Du Nord Cocktail Room and the new Lagniappe restaurant in the Coliseum Building, was one of the first to open a business in the building. The Du Nord Cocktail Room is the “spiritual successor” to the original Du Nord distillery, the nation’s first Black-owned distillery, which closed because of the pandemic in 2020 and stayed closed after it was damaged during the civil unrest after Floyd’s murder.

Now, Montana can see the former Third Precinct building when he walks out of his newly reopened cocktail room and newly opened restaurant. He called the building a “large monument to our most recent time.” 

As for the razor wire, Montana said: “I don’t know what we’re protecting with that barbed wire. We want the area to be inviting. We want businesses to come back, and I think they’re less likely to do that when we have barbed wire and fencing.” 

At the same time, the building is a part of history, and the business owner said it will take time to figure out what it will become. 

“I think that it makes sense for it to be a public space,” he said. “I also think that it makes sense for it to be a public space that is inclusive and not just about one group of people and their experience, particularly one group of people and their experience with the Minneapolis police. I say that as a Black man.” 

Council decided last year police would not return to the site. This year, the city proposed that the former site become a  “democracy center” with 8,000 square feet of community use space on the ground floor. This proposal garnered backlash from some council members earlier this year, but the city has moved forward with community engagement on its proposed plan.  

“I really don’t mind what they’re proposing,” Montana said. “I think that there is something empowering about it being a space that helps people in the city vote. And I kind of love that. And if there’s going to be some other spaces for people to use it and gather and all discuss I mean personally from a business perspective, we’ve always taken the angle that more discussion is better. Creating public spaces where people can get together is always a better solution than something that’s walled off or you turn into some sort of museum exhibit where you walk through and don’t talk. I’d like to see it be used.” 

While the former Third Precinct building remains in the remediation and planning phase, Montana noted that the Coliseum Building stands as an example of what can be accomplished through community and partnership. 

Funding for the building’s $28 million rehab and remodel came from a mix of private and public players including New Markets Tax Credits, historic tax credits, a Property Assessed Clean Energy loan, philanthropic donations and a variety of grants. Nonprofit Redesign Inc. managed the project with a range of community partners. 

“In the time frame that this election is going to happen, we’re not going to be able to turn the Third Precinct from what it has been for the past four years into some beautiful monument to progress,” Montana said. “But I think if JD Vance had turned around, he would have looked across the street, he would have seen that buildings have been rebuilt, economic activity is coming back. And the reason for that — we’re a perfect example, I think — of how government and private organizations can come together to make something happen… That is a story I’d rather tell.”

Winter Keefer

Winter Keefer is MinnPost’s Metro reporter. Follow her on Twitter or email her at wkeefer@minnpost.com.

The post Third Precinct razor wire will come down soon. Why did it take this long? appeared first on MinnPost.

For Katie Wright, the most important part of a settlement with Brooklyn Center over the killing of her son wasn’t the money. It was promises of change and the hope that what happened to 20-year-old Daunte Wright would never happen again. 

But, three years after police officer Kim Potter shot and killed Wright’s son, very little has changed, she said on a summer evening as she sat with Amity Dimock, the mother of Kobe Dimock-Heisler, a 21-year-old who was shot and killed by a Brooklyn Center officer two years earlier. The two women founded the Daunte and Kobe No More Names Initiative, a nonprofit advocating for police reform. 

While the two cases and the consequences for the officers were different – Wright was killed during a traffic stop while Dimock-Heisler, who had autism, was killed in his home during a mental health crisis – both mothers have advocated for changes they say haven’t happened: limiting traffic stops in the city for minor violations and establishing a long-term oversight committee to advise the city and police department on matters about policing.  

“All they’ve done is prolong,” Wright said. “They’ve done what cities always do – they wait for it to get swept under the rug. People forget. They forget, just like that. Then cities think they can go on, business as usual.” 

“I don’t think (police are) all losers, but people just bootlicking, saying they-can-do-no-wrong, is bullshit,” Dimock added. She was clear she would be blunt when speaking about this topic. 

Both were hopeful when the City Council adopted the Daunte Wright and Kobe Dimock-Heisler Community Safety and Violence Prevention Act in 2021 and when promises were made as part of a $3.25 million wrongful death lawsuit settlement Wright’s family made with the city in 2022. But now, the mothers and their nonprofit are considering suing the city for not following through on changes in policing.

And in the meantime, Katie Wright fears another mother could lose a child at the hands of police if the city delays or fails to implement changes.

What’s changed and what hasn’t in three years? 

Looking at the 2021 resolution passed a month after Wright was killed, some parts have been chipped away, others stalled, and some pieces addressed, at least in pilot form. 

This year, specifically, has come with its share of disappointments for Daunte and Kobe’s mothers. In January, the Brooklyn Center City Council shot down an ordinance that would have prohibited traffic stops for minor traffic violations in the city. The vote was 2-3 with only Mayor April Graves and council member Marquita Butler voting for it. 

According to traffic stop data provided by the city, stops have been down by 40% since Daunte Wright’s death. However, a data analysis by the parents’ attorneys shows that at least 49% of those stopped in the past three years were Black, while the city’s population is less than a third Black. In addition, in a quarter of the stops, no race information was recorded, making it more difficult to draw conclusions. But the parents suspect many of those “unknown” cases involved people of color.  Meanwhile, 19.5% of the traffic stops involved white motorists in a city whose population is 38% white.

The settlement agreement required the city to provide bias training through the University of St. Thomas, which the university has confirmed it has completed.  

However, other pieces of the resolution, which the lawsuit settlement instructed the city to follow through on, have been stalled and sunsetted. A few months ago, the Daunte Wright and Kobe Dimock-Heisler Community Safety and Violence Prevention Implementation Committee, an advisory committee created through the resolution, was sunsetted. The committee was tasked with providing recommendations for policy reforms, but the mothers say the city never implemented the committee’s proposals, pointing back to the traffic stop ordinance that was ultimately shot down. 

Brooklyn Center officials say the committee was never meant to be permanent. While creating a permanent violence prevention committee has been discussed, there is no consensus on what that will look like, what powers it will have or when it will be formed. 

On the flip side, the city did recently take a step toward partnering with community groups to create non-police officer mental health responses to 911 calls, which is a piece of the resolution. This came after the summer conversation with the mothers. 

In September, the council passed a pilot program for mental health response that involves two separate contracts. One contract is with Canopy Roots, a mental health organization offering culturally affirming unarmed first responder services to people in crisis via 911. This organization also serves Minneapolis. 

The other contract is with the Hennepin County Human Services and Public Health Department to provide an alternative response for select 911 calls to Brooklyn Center “in a manner that most effectively and efficiently supports and protects the physical, mental, and behavioral health of individuals,” according to the agreement passed by the council at its Sept. 9 meeting. 

During the $750,000 pilot, which is funded through Dec. 31, 2025, officials will collect data and evaluate the possibility of extending the partnership. The city’s general fund is paying for 12% of the program, with the rest funded through grants and supporting funds including grants from Pohlad Collaborative Solutions, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Hennepin County, and American Rescue Plan funds. 

Meanwhile, the City Council has started a review process for the resolution as it stands now. This process would only lead to “minor edits,” mostly to specific verbiage, according to Brooklyn Center Mayor April Graves. But the Daunte and Kobe No More Names Initiative are concerned that this review will lead to continued stalls to tangible reform. 

What officials are saying 

The makeup of both city administration and the Brooklyn Center City Council has shifted quite a bit over the last few years. So has police department leadership. 

Mayor April Graves was a council member when Daunte Wright was killed. She ran for mayor and won in 2022. Graves said her goal in running was to help unify the city. 

As the Brooklyn Center council reviews the Daunte Wright and Kobe Dimock-Heisler Community Safety and Violence Prevention Act, Graves said she wants to maintain the vision and values of the original resolution while “ensuring council consensus and incorporating staff input during the review process.”

As for sunsetting the implementation committee, Graves said the committee’s work and recommendations had “pretty much wrapped.” Now the council is considering how to define the structure, roles, and authority of the permanent advisory committee to avoid duplication of efforts by other city committees, ensure clarity and maintain continuity in the public safety reform efforts.

“Because of council consensus, sunsetting it made sense so we could think about some other pieces (of the resolution) we have yet to implement,” she said. 

Much of the conversation by city officials about change in the city has revolved around a culture change, the mayor said. Graves noted that the city hired a new human resources and equity director after Daunte Wright was killed. 

“Yes, we’ve moved forward on some things and other things we didn’t necessarily move forward on since then,” she said. “But I think I can honestly say that the council and the staff all care about making sure that everybody in Brooklyn Center feels safe and that we don’t want to ever see anything like that happen again. I think I can honestly say, too, that we’re having difficult conversations and we’re not finished.”

The city has also had multiple police chiefs since Daunte Wright was killed. In the summer, the newest chief for the department, Garett Flesland, started his new role. While he is new to the chief position, Flesland has served on the Brooklyn Center Police Department for 24 years. 

“Big picture, I consider myself a local kid,” Flesland said, who grew up in Brooklyn Park. 

Now, Flesland said his main goal coming into the chief position is to provide stability within the department. When asked about changes on the books, Flesland deferred to the state Legislature or city council. 

Again, the conversation with Flesland mostly revolved around cultural shifts.

“I want to consciously leverage the increased dialogue we as a community have had. If I look at the last three years and compare that to 10 years ago or 15 years ago, I believe there’s so much more communication in general,” the chief said. 

To chief Flesland, Brooklyn Center hasn’t changed as much as people think it has over the last two decades. 

“My entire time here, this has been a diverse community,” he said. “Yes, if we look at and drill down to specific numbers, the percentages have maybe changed a little bit, but we’ve always had a bunch of columns when we’ve looked at who makes up Brooklyn Center.”

However, the numbers show a different story. Those columns have changed significantly. The city was 90% white in 1990, but in 2020 U.S. Census data shows the city of 32,000 is now 38% white, nearly 32% Black and nearly 14% Asian. And 15% of residents listed their ethnicity as Hispanic or Latino. 

Some researchers, including Will Stancil  a fellow at the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota Law School, believe demographics in suburbs like Brooklyn Center have shifted faster than systems like policing. 

““What you get is there’s a disconnect between the police force and the community they are tasked with protecting and serving,” Stancil said, adding that Brooklyn Center has the highest percentage of residents of color in the Twin Cities.

Again, Chief Flesland was surprised to hear about this large demographic shift that has occurred in his city and within his time with the Brooklyn Center Police Department. It’s easy not to see change when you’re in the place that’s changing, Flesland conceded. While in the span of decades, change can seem slow, it doesn’t mean the shifts aren’t significant. 

State policy around traffic stops

The Daunte and Kobe No More Names Initiative has more work to do, Amity Dimock said. The group’s advocacy work extends beyond Brooklyn Center. This year, Dimock said they will continue to focus on petitioning the state Legislature for statewide traffic stop policy change.  

“(Police) have proven to us that they can’t do low-level traffic stops without being racially biased. And the end result is, unfortunately, Black and brown bodies. We’re just not accepting it,” Dimock said.  

According to Justice Innovation Lab, a national data center led by former prosecutors, policymakers, and community advocates, at least 800 people since 2017 have been killed by law enforcement during interactions that started with a traffic stop. 

Wright was killed during a traffic stop after Potter pulled him over for expired license tags and an air freshener hanging from his rearview mirror. Potter claimed she thought she was pulling out her taser instead of her gun when she shot him. In the months that followed, there were calls for the state, cities and counties to end “pretext stops,” or stops for minor violations that police hope will lead to evidence of other crimes. 

These stops often disproportionately impact Black drivers, including in Minneapolis, where the U.S. Justice Department found that Black individuals were 6.5 times more likely to be stopped by Minneapolis police officers. Based on the Justice Department’s analysis of traffic stop data in Brooklyn Center, the suburb’s disparity is about the same. 

Lawmakers at the State Capitol have introduced legislation multiple times over the last few sessions that would limit pretext stops statewide, but their efforts to get the bill passed have been unsuccessful so far. 

Meanwhile, efforts by smaller governments have proved effective. Ramsey County, for example, limited non-public safety related traffic stops after finding that Black drivers were disproportionately stopped by police. Two years later, an analysis of the policy showed a decrease in racial disparities related to traffic stops while having no discernible impact on public safety. 

Kim Potter and who teaches police moving forward  

Kim Potter was sentenced to two years in prison after she was convicted of manslaughter for the killing of Daunte Wright. She was released from prison after 16 months. 

Recently, Potter made headlines again. Last month, Potter was slated to speak at a Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Oversight Agency training titled: “Remorse to Redemption: Lessons Learned.” This  came about after Potter met with Imran Ali, the prosecutor who charged her case, proposing using her case as a teaching opportunity to teach officers what not to do. However, after The Seattle Times reported about her upcoming speaking engagement, the hosting agency’s leadership canceled the training. 

While the Seattle event was canceled, The Associated Press reported last week that Potter and Ali have delivered presentations at Minnesota Sheriff’s Association events in June and September. They also presented at a law enforcement conference in Indiana in May. 

The decision to bring Potter in to speak was made by “well-meaning” officers in the Seattle agency’s leadership “who were looking to learn from someone’s mistakes,” the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Oversight Agency’s board chair David Postman, told the New York Times.

“But this decision was made without the conversation that needs to happen around issues like this,” Postman said after he was part of rescinding the invitation. 

This incident has sparked debate over whether or not a former police officer who was sentenced for shooting and killing a Black man should be training officers. In the same New York Times article, Minnesota’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, called the cancellation of Potter’s talk “a missed opportunity.”

But Katie Wright called the speaking engagements “a slap in the face.” 

For the trip to Washington, Potter’s flight and hotel would have been paid for, and she would have received a small stipend. Imagine being a mother who sees her son’s killer profit off of her part in that story, Wright said. 

“Nobody until the day that I die will be able to profit off of our tragedy,” Wright said. “That’s not OK. Why would you want to do that? And people are saying she’s trying to right her wrongs. Well, she can’t do that. The only way that she could ever right her wrongs ever again in her life is if she could give me my son back.” 

If officers want to learn why it’s important not to use deadly force, Wright said she or other family members of loved ones killed by police could speak to that. 

The memorial

On a Thursday evening, Katie Wright and Amity Dimock sat in front of the Daunte Wright memorial at the intersection of 63rd Avenue North and Katherine Drive in Brooklyn Center.

At one point, Dimock started singing “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by the Beatles. Grasping Wright’s hand, Amity and Wright joked that they’ve been hanging out too much over the last few years. They’ve grown close, sharing a common goal. 

It was a cool day. Flowers were planted in the spot where Daunte Wright died after attempting to flee from Potter after she shot him. An offering bowl was placed in front of his memorial. It’s imprinted with the folds of the clothes he was wearing the day he was killed. Wright traced the crevices in the bowl with her fingertips. She pointed to the utility pole across the street. It was adorned with air fresheners, all depicting messages for Wright: “I love you,” “I miss you” and “Justice for Daunte.” 

This memorial was also part of the Wright families’ settlement agreement. But, at the time, the city still needed to change Daunte’s cause of death written on a memorial plaque. It was listed on Daunte Wright’s death certificate that his cause of death was a “gunshot wound to the chest.” The death certificate also said “homicide.” His family said the plaque also should say “homicide.”

“Verbiage and language is super important, especially to a city that has caused such harmful things to communities,” Wright said. “The death certificate, even though it says homicide, that doesn’t necessarily mean murder, right? If you’re killed by somebody else, it’s still considered a homicide, which is super important.”

Update: This story has been updated to reflect that the Potter and Ali presented at a conference in Indiana not Iowa.

Winter Keefer

Winter Keefer is MinnPost’s Metro reporter. Follow her on Twitter or email her at wkeefer@minnpost.com.

The post Three years after Daunte Wright was killed by police, what’s changed in Brooklyn Center? appeared first on MinnPost.

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey is excited about the idea of using bubbles to quell downtown violence.

Yes, bubbles.

Frey shared the potential strategy during a weekend panel at MinnPost Festival. 

“Apparently, if you’ve got a whole bunch of people that are looking to cause trouble – if you put bubbles out there, it’s really hard to look tough when you’ve got bubbles floating around,” Frey said.

Axios Twin Cities reporter Nick Halter, who moderated the Saturday panel, followed up, asking Frey: “We’re talking about (bubbles), like at a kid’s birthday?” 

“Yeah. You think I’m joking. I’m actually not,” Frey responded. “It’s a bubble machine – and the people who are looking to cause trouble are like, ‘I can’t look tough around these bubbles.’ So they disperse and it deescalates the situation and people who aren’t looking to cause trouble love bubbles.” 

Frey said he’d heard from his staff about a new public safety strategy on his drive over to the event held at Westminster Presbyterian Church, calling the bubble tactic “very premature… But obviously I thought it was pretty innovative.” 

Using bubbles is not an official Minneapolis Police Department strategy, MPD officials clarified this week. However, some downtown businesses do use bubbles in parking lots to deter crime, according to the mayor’s office spokesperson Ally Peters. For example, they are deployed at the 414 Hennepin parking lot and outside the Brass Rail Lounge, also on Hennepin downtown.  

Similar in concept to bubbles, Twin Cities businesses have tried using classical music to deter crime, including in 2006 at Gameworks on Block E and, more recently, at Midway Marketplace in St. Paul.

Related | Nick Halter from Axios talks with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey at MinnPost Festival

So, while dispersing bubbles may not be a standard tactic in crime prevention, it isn’t an unheard of tool. And there is a reason why seeking new methods to deescalate violence has been on the mayor’s mind. Prior to a few weeks back, the city had seen a significant reduction in crime across the board, including downtown, Frey said, crediting the city’s late night downtown safety plan and a push to get record numbers of guns off the streets. But, “these last couple weeks were bad,” he said. 

Over the last few weeks, violence has returned and escalated twice at one of the city’s hotspots for fights. On Sept. 14 and Sept. 21, three people were killed – ages 16, 20 and 21– and many more injured as conflicts escalated at the corner of Hennepin Avenue and Fifth Street .

This area has long been a scene for fights, often among teenagers. Over the last five years or so, those getting into fights, having guns and committing other crimes like carjackings have been younger and younger, Frey said. 

“There’ll be a beef or a fight between somebody – that starts oftentimes online, sometimes it’s about a girl – and they’ll get in an argument and it leads to: ‘I’ll see you at 11 p.m. at Fifth and Hennepin,” he said.  

MPD has been working to address the downtown violence, with a focus on teens, but bubbles have not been a recent talking point within MPD, Sgt. Garrett Parten said. Instead, MPD increased officer presence over the weekend. The department also has deployed a unit designated to interact with teens prior to the downtown curfew. Youth under the age of 12 must be out of downtown and home before 10 p.m., under the age of 14 by 11 p.m. and ages 15-17, by midnight. 

“When you talk to a private company (using bubbles), this was in addition to several other efforts they had, including added security, using gates, towing vehicles, things like that,” Parten said. “So it’s hard to know how much effect bubbles actually had because it’s just one part of a concerted effort.” 

Winter Keefer

Winter Keefer is MinnPost’s Metro reporter. Follow her on Twitter or email her at wkeefer@minnpost.com.

The post Bubbles as a violence de-escalation tactic? The Minneapolis mayor loves the idea.  appeared first on MinnPost.

Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty on Monday called for a 15-year-old murder conviction to be vacated after a new review of the evidence points to the innocence of the man imprisoned for the crime.

Edgar Barrientos-Quintana was convicted in 2009 for the murder of 18-year-old Jesse Mickelson during a drive-by shooting in south Minneapolis, in which Mickelson was a bystander. Members of Mickelson’s family joined Moriarty at the Monday news conference, calling for the release of Barrientos-Quintana and apologizing to his family for having to be without their family member for more than a decade.

“It’s been 16 years, but I would rather have no conviction than the wrong conviction,” said Tina Rosebear, Mickelson’s sister. “I want to apologize, most importantly, because I held a lot of anger for a man that had nothing to do with it and it hurts to know that we were failed because of a wrong conviction.”

The calls for Barrientos-Quintana’s release come less than two months after the Conviction Review Unit (CRU) housed within Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office concluded a three-year investigation into the conviction and trial. The unit’s report released in late July found a “confluence of errors made by criminal justice system actors (that) resulted in a wrongful conviction.”

Moriarty’s office filed a brief on Monday agreeing the conviction should be vacated, and pledged to immediately drop the charges against Barrientos-Quintana if the conviction is overturned, she said. 

“We are hopeful that the court will give Mr. Barrientos-Quintana the relief he deserves, but this is a sad day all around,” Moriarty told reporters. “Our legal system failed Mr. Barrientos-Quintana. Our legal system also failed Jesse’s family, who almost 16 years later, must again wonder who killed their loved one.”

The CRU found security footage from a Cub Foods in the Maplewood area showing Barrientos-Quintana at the grocery store 33 minutes before the shooting, which occurred in Minneapolis. Phone data – which was not shown to the jury during the trial – also corroborated Barrientos-Quintana’s claim that he was at his girlfriend’s apartment during the time of the shooting, placing him at the Maplewood home 27 minutes after the shooting. 

According to CRU investigators, the combination of the phone records and security footage make it impossible for Barrientos-Quintana to have driven to Minneapolis to commit the crime then back again within that time frame.

There was no physical evidence tying Barrientos-Quintana to the crime, including the lack of DNA evidence and the absence of the gun used in the shooting, which was never found, according to the report. Witnesses also described the shooter as having a “shiny” or closely shaved bald head, but the security footage just before the shooting showed Barrientos-Quintana with a thick head of dark hair, which he still had in the arrest photo taken 11 days after the shooting.

Photo lineups used by Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) investigators featured an old photo of Barrientos-Quintana with a shaved head. The report also says MPD investigators used coercive interrogation techniques, threatening witnesses with prosecution and pressuring others to name Barrientos-Quintana as the shooter despite identifying someone else as the shooter early on. 

The case was also featured in an episode of the television show “First 48,” which follows homicide investigators as they try to solve cases – often within 48 hours – that aired less than one month before the trial. The CRU report says the involvement of the show contributed to the wrongful conviction due to witnesses watching the episode,  which showed edited footage of Barrientos-Quintana’s arrest and interrogation, before testifying, and prosecutors having access to scripted comments made by a lead investigator during the episode long before the defense. 

The MPD detective on the case, Chris Gaiters, is now the department’s Assistant Chief of Community Trust, and current Hennepin County Judge Hilary Caligiuri prosecuted the case. Susan Crumb, another former prosecutor on the case, sent a memo to Moriarty’s office saying she still believes Barrientos-Quintana to be guilty and that the CRU report is acting off of confirmation bias. 

Due to the potential conflicts of interest, Moriarty said the chief judge of Hennepin County District Court asked the state Supreme Court to assign the case to a judge outside of the county. She said the case now lies with a retired Anoka County judge, who has 90 days to make a decision on whether to overturn the conviction.

Mohamed Ibrahim

Mohamed Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter. He can be reached at mibrahim@minnpost.com.

The post Hennepin County attorney calls for release of wrongfully convicted man appeared first on MinnPost.

While violent crime has diminished as a priority for Minnesotans in recent years, a stark divide between voters’ political affiliations and their perception of safety in the Twin Cities persists, according to a new MinnPost-Embold Research poll.

Only about a quarter of 1,616 likely voters across the state surveyed between Sept. 4 and Sept. 8 had violent crime as one of their top four priorities, which is down from 31% in last year’s poll and 42% in 2022. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 2.8 percentage points.

Public safety has fallen as a prominent election issue when compared to the past two major elections in 2020 and 2022. The 2020 murder of George Floyd by then-Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was fresh in voters’ minds, and many Democrats called for law enforcement reform while many Republicans expressed unwavering support for police. Spikes in violent crime during the coronavirus pandemic that ebbed and flowed in the years that followed also played a role in how voters cast their ballots, but issues like the rising costs of goods and the overturning of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court appear to be more important for voters this time around.

“Crime, particularly violent crime, is not a top issue. I mean it gets a lot of attention and Republicans in particular talk about it a lot, but we’ve got a whole lot of other issues that are getting far more attention,” University of Minnesota political science professor Larry Jacobs said in an interview. “For Democrats who might have been worried about crime, and particularly Minneapolis, it’s not appearing on the list for top concerns among Minnesotans.”

Respondents of color were more likely to be concerned about violent crime and have the issue as a top priority this election at 32% compared to just 22% of white respondents, with Black and Hispanic respondents much more likely to be concerned at 40% and 39%, respectively. Those percentages dipped to 26% among college-educated respondents of color.

The number of women of color who had violent crime as a priority was much higher at 37% when compared to white women at 19%, whereas the numbers for white men and men of color were nearly identical at 26% and 27%, respectively.

A third of respondents who voted for former President Donald Trump in 2020 called violent crime a top issue for them while only 16% of President Joe Biden voters concurred. The figures were nearly identical along party lines. Respondents who identified as independents matched GOP respondents at 32%.

When compared to last year’s poll, which had 40% of Republican and 23% of Democratic respondents list violent crime as a priority, the political divide remains, but the decline in the issue as a motivator for voters in the 2024 election is still reflected. Even among Republicans, both polls showed issues including rising costs, illegal immigration, taxes and election security as bigger priorities than violent crime.

Perception of safety

When asked how safe they feel in different regions, about half of all respondents said they feel very safe or somewhat in the Twin Cities at 49%, but figures varied wildly based on respondents’ political affiliations. While respondents who identified as Democrats and Republicans both said they feel very safe or somewhat safe in the neighborhoods where they live – 95% and 89%, respectively – only 12% of GOP respondents said they feel very safe or somewhat safe in the Twin Cities compared to 87% of Democrat respondents.

Jacobs, who said he has researched and interviewed rural Minnesotans about the topic, said the cause seems to be a lack of familiarity with the cities, but also a suspicion of them as well that is driven by partisanship.

“A number of Republican politicians have been quite critical of Minneapolis after the George Floyd (protests) and I think if you spend time in rural Minnesota, you pick up quite a bit of animosity towards the urban areas,” he said.

Though the differences aren’t as stark, Embold Research pollster Jessica Mason said the regions in which respondents live also played a role in their perceptions of safety. 

Respondents who lived in the Twin Cities reported lower rates of feeling very safe or somewhat safe in their own neighborhoods at 82% when compared to their counterparts in the suburbs and Greater Minnesota at 94% and 96%, respectively. However, when asked how safe they feel in the Twin Cities specifically, Twin Cities respondents saw a small change with 76% responding favorably, whereas there was a considerable dropoff with suburban respondents at 48% and an even steeper decline with Greater Minnesota respondents at 31%.

“Although there is a high likelihood that partisanship does come into play here, we do see that geography is a factor,” she said.

There was also a divide between older and younger respondents. Two-thirds of respondents between the ages of 18 and 34 said they feel safe in the Twin Cities, but that number starts to decline with the older age groups. Less than half of respondents in the 35-plus range said they feel safe in Minneapolis and St. Paul.

MinnPost freelance data journalist Michael Nolan contributed to this report.

Mohamed Ibrahim

Mohamed Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter. He can be reached at mibrahim@minnpost.com.

The post Poll: Crime no longer a top issue in Minnesota; huge partisan divide on Twin Cities safety appeared first on MinnPost.

Following their first unsuccessful attempt earlier this year, a couple police accountability advocacy groups relaunched another effort to establish civilian control of the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) via a citizen petition to get a question on municipal ballot in 2025.

Dozens of people gathered in front of the charred remains of the Minneapolis Police’s old Third Precinct building on Thursday as two groups – Minneapolis for Community Control of the Police (M4CCP) and Twin Cities Coalition for Justice (TCC4J) – held a rally and march to launch a second effort to amend the city charter and establish the Civilian Police Accountability Commission. The commission would be an elected body of 13 civilians that would have the power to discipline and discharge any MPD employee – including the chief – investigate incidents and decide the department’s budget.

The second attempt comes after the groups submitted a petition to the city clerk in May that featured more than 10,000 signatures, which was more than the required 8,943 signatures, or 5% of the total number of voters in Minneapolis in the previous election, needed to get an initiative on the 2024 ballot. The city clerk’s office rejected nearly 5,000 of the signatures and gave the groups 10 days to reach the threshold but they couldn’t get the remaining signatures in time.

“Personally, when I got the news, I was crushed as I felt years of organizing and hundreds of hours of work had been thrown away by bureaucratic technicalities,” said Jae Yates of both M4CCP and TCC4J. “But this feeling of defeat was immediately replaced by determination and resolve as I watched TCC4J members immediately mobilize to say ‘What’s next?’”

Jon Martin, deputy director of the city’s elections and voter services, said in order for the initiative to get on the ballot, the groups must submit the signatures by May 1 of next year. The signature threshold will likely be higher this time around because it will be based on 5% of the number of ballots cast in Minneapolis in the 2024 election, and voter turnout is typically higher in presidential years.

Once submitted, each signature is verified by staff in the city clerk’s office. 

“What that process is, is that they make sure each signature line is completely filled out, and then they verify that the address that the person wrote down on the signature line is the address that they’re currently registered at with the city of Minneapolis,” Martin said.

If the threshold is reached, then the petition is forwarded to the city attorney’s office to do a legal review of the question. The question is then sent to the Minneapolis City Council to draft ballot question language, he said.

If successful, the measure would be the second question to make it onto the ballot seeking to remove sole authority over MPD from Mayor Jacob Frey since the murder of George Floyd by Derek Chauvin in 2020. The first question, spearheaded by Yes4Minneapolis, would have replaced MPD with a Department of Public Safety and shifted authority over the department to the City Council. It failed in the 2021 municipal election, though about 43% voted in favor of it.

A spokesman for Frey said in a statement that the mayor does not support the initiative, saying the commission would “dilute accountability by inserting 13 bosses in the chain of command for the police department.”

“The proposal did not make sense in 2021 and still does not make sense today,” said the spokesman. “The mayor continues to support the build-out of the existing Community Commission on Police Oversight and the Chief’s development of a more accountable and transparent department through adherence to the settlement agreement, a new police contract, enhanced community engagement, and ongoing training initiatives.”

Mohamed Ibrahim

Mohamed Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter. He can be reached at mibrahim@minnpost.com.

The post A second attempt to establish civilian control of Minneapolis Police Department appeared first on MinnPost.

Walking north down 3rd Avenue South toward the corner of East 31st Street in south Minneapolis, a pedestrian detour sign points foot traffic west down 31st Street. But you can’t walk far, at least not legally. A massive gate meets foot traffic looking to cross under the Interstate 35W overpass. 

Why is it there? 

The Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) evicted an encampment under the 35W bridge on 31st Street in early August. MnDOT has jurisdiction over the infrastructure under expressway overpasses. Shortly after the eviction, a fence was erected around the sidewalk to prevent future camps. 

A MnDOT spokesperson sent this statement to MinnPost regarding the fence: “Highway right-of-way and roadways are not safe places for human beings to live and be and for safety reasons fencing needed to be installed in this location.” 

MnDOT coordinated with service providers and state and county partners to provide information, support and alternatives to people at the site including the Hennepin County Streets to Housing team, according to the statement.

While they didn’t want to be quoted by name in this story, several people walking around the area near the fence on a recent afternoon said they didn’t feel comfortable walking through the area before the fence was erected either because so many people and tents were under the overpass. 

There are anywhere between 300 to 500 unhoused people living outside in Hennepin county, said Daniel Weckman, outreach manager for local nonprofit Twin Cities Recovery Project. 

For organizations working with the city’s unhoused population, displacements like the one in August force groups to start over in building relationships and finding resources for the affected people, Weckman said. 

“Every time they do one of these breakdown-and-moves, somebody gets retraumatized and we have to go and start over, find them all over again and try to find these resources for the individual,” he said. 

Dispersing camps doesn’t fix the problems preventing people living outside from finding shelter, Weckman noted. Instead, most move on to the next place. In the case of those who moved from the 35W overpass, many moved to spaces around the former Kmart site at Lake Street and 1st Avenue South and around the intersection of Stevens Avenue and East Lake Street. However, the Twin Cities Recovery Project hasn’t located all who’d been identified as living under the overpass. 

Often when a camp is dispersed, people spread out. It usually takes at least a week for people to congregate again, Weckman said. 

“I’m just hoping that when we do find them we find the people we’re looking for,” Weckman said.

Twin Cities Recovery Project serves as a daytime shelter. People can come to the nonprofit’s offices at 3400 East Lake Street in south Minneapolis and 1011 West Broadway in north Minneapolis from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The center distributes donations of food and clothing it collects to people in need who show up. 

Outside of Twin Cities Recovery Project, Weckman said people seeking shelter can use a program called Adult Shelter Connect, which aims to give access to every open bed in Hennepin County and Ramsey County. 

Long term, Weckman said a permanent solution is needed. 

“We can’t keep having these small encampments and breaking them down and moving people, breaking them down and moving people. We need a brick-and-mortar solution,” he said.

Winter Keefer

Winter Keefer is MinnPost’s Metro reporter. Follow her on Twitter or email her at wkeefer@minnpost.com.

The post Why is there a fence blocking a Minneapolis sidewalk under 35W on 31st Street? appeared first on MinnPost.

The Unity Community Mediation Team (UCMT), one of the oldest public safety-focused nonprofit organizations in Minneapolis, is seeking nearly $2 million from the city to continue its work. 

Al Flowers, one of UCMT’s original members, said to achieve the goal of cultivating trust between community and the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) – after decades of volunteer work – the group needs city funding to continue its work.

“Now, the system is saying they want a community based solution,” said Flowers. “That is what we have created.”

Origins of UCMT

The UCMT began way back in December 2003, when original founders Ron Edwards and Clyde Bellecourt brought the concerns of community members to the U.S. Department of Justice regarding multiple incidents of police violence, namely against Black and Indigenous residents of the city. That led to the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding by the department and UCMT, prompting weekly meetings between the two sides for five years – called the Police Community Relations Council (PCRC) – about the implementation of 106 action items in the document, which were nearly 70% complete by 2008. But that year, city officials decided not to continue the PCRC, which remained stagnant until the murder of George Floyd by a white MPD officer in 2020 jump-started the effort once more and the document was renewed in 2022. 

Since then, the UCMT’s main functions have involved providing resources for community members who have had negative interactions with MPD officers. UCMT volunteers then relay the complaints to the department, review body camera footage of the incident and, when necessary, mediate between the individuals and the officers involved in order to come to a resolution. 

“We’ve been doing this for over 20 years with the police department, so they’ve gotten to know us and they trust us,” said mental health professional and UCMT member Mark Anderson. “So if we say ‘a family says that you beat up this child,’ they’ll say, ‘Well, come on downtown and look at the video,’ and so we can help mediate between the community and the police department because we have trust on both sides.”

In addition to providing community members with access to police services, the group is also trying to improve access to officers as well in an effort to improve relations between the department and residents. Since May, according to the group, every new MPD officer has been assigned a “community mentor” by the UCMT – someone who can familiarize officers with their patrol area and the people who live there.

“We’re developing a network so the officers could feel the support and the connection with the community from their side,” Flowers said. “It’s not just us learning to trust officers, it’s officers learning to trust community and work together.”

Future of UCMT

During the renewal of the UCMT’s mediation efforts following Floyd’s murder, the outpouring by the city’s younger residents during the protests in 2020 prompted the group’s elders to start thinking about the future of their efforts. That resulted in the creation of the UCMT’s Young People Task Force, led in part by Flowers’ son Alfred Flowers Jr. 

“I was standing outside at the Third Precinct protesting when George Floyd was murdered, and I don’t regret a second of it, but what I also realized was OK, now what’s next? What do we want to get done?”

The task force has been active in relaying concerns to MPD and getting policies created or changed. One example was the role they played in helping to get no-knock warrants banned for good following the killing of Amir Locke by a Minneapolis SWAT team in 2022. That same year, the task force also brought awareness to the lack of MPD policy regarding DNA collection of juveniles after a 13-year-old boy was detained by officers and allegedly had samples taken. That eventually led to legislation passed at the Capitol to prevent DNA collection of minors without parental consent.

Now with 15 members who meet each Thursday, the task force has also been working to strengthen the bond between community members and police through events like group fishing and police and UCMT handing out free backpacks to kids ahead of the school year.

All of the services provided by UCMT volunteers are free of charge, but that model is becoming more unsustainable for the volunteers, said Al Flowers. During a presentation to the City Council’s Public Health and Safety Committee, the organization is now asking the city for about $937,000 a year for two years to help maintain the eight sites where UCMT volunteers operate. 

The sites include UCMT headquarters, NAACP Minneapolis and New Salem Baptist Church in north Minneapolis, as well as Indigenous Protector Movement, Little Earth Residents Association, Cedar Riverside Opportunity Center, Voice of East Africa Women and Nuestra Lucha on the city’s south side. 

Because the sites are community-based, the funds split between the eight sites would not only go toward helping to continue providing UCMT services at each site, but they’d also go toward funding the other services provided by each of the organizations represented.

“While the UCMT is the overseer of (our programs) at these community satellite sites, this is not strictly for UCMT – we’re trying to make sure that those other sites that we have are funded as well,” Flowers Jr. said. “So it’s not as if the UCMT is getting all of that money. We just had to break it down so that each site is taken care of.”

Ward 9 Council member and Public Health and Safety Committee chair, Jason Chavez, said during an interview that he’s very interested in the goal behind the idea for the community sites, which is to help immigrants and communities of color file police reports, but how it’ll be funded remains unclear. 

“The appealing thing to me is for the city to be able to support community based sites to make sure that people can feel safe filing police complaints,” Chavez said. “Now in regards to the funding stream, that has to be a conversation had by Council. Are we funding the entire project? Are we funding one site and piloting it and seeing what this could look like?”

Chavez said he plans to have follow-up conversations with UCMT, as well as with the city attorney and civil rights department to ensure the sites wouldn’t run afoul of any city policies or the ongoing consent decree process.

Mohamed Ibrahim

Mohamed Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter. He can be reached at mibrahim@minnpost.com.

The post Community group in Minneapolis seeks $2 million to continue work of police oversight, mediation appeared first on MinnPost.

A non-profit government transparency organization has filed a lawsuit against a state agency for its alleged failure to produce documents related to the unrest following the murder of George Floyd in 2020.

Public Record Media filed the district court complaint Thursday asking the Department of Public Safety to produce documents, including transcripts and recordings of interviews done in an after-action report conducted under contract with Wilder Research. Despite having two years to produce the records, DPS either has not responded or — only recently — said it doesn’t have the documents.

But Public Record Media founder and board member Matt Ehling noted at a press conference Friday that under the contract DPS signed with Wilder, all work product and documents produced for the study “must be immediately returned to the state by contractor upon completion or cancellation of this contract.”

The Wilder report was released in March 2022 and concluded, among other findings, that there was a lack of communication and coordination in the first days of arson and looting between Minneapolis, Gov. Tim Walz and his public safety leadership.

“The tragedy and trauma that unfolded in summer 2020 were significant, unplanned, and unprecedented,” the report concluded. “Moving forward, the state has the opportunity to focus on building functional systems, plans, and relationships that will lead to a response to civil unrest that supports all Minnesotans, especially communities of color and, specifically, Black Minnesotans.”

But the report only cited the people it interviewed in anonymous terms, such as “state law enforcement official” and “local government official.” While some of the more than four dozen interviews conducted were with community leaders and residents, Public Record Media limited its request to transcripts or recordings of interviews with then-DPS Commissioner John Harrington, then-State Patrol Chief Matt Langer, local police chiefs Booker Hodges and Medaria Arradondo, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Walz.

And while it relied upon public government data, such as emails or text messages, those, too, were not released. Ehling said that Wilder was provided “unique access” to material and individuals and while the report is public, the information gathered by Wilder could give the public new insights into those seven days in May 2020 that shook the region.

“We acknowledge the public’s interest in the data related to the state’s response to the civil unrest following the murder of George Floyd,” wrote DPS spokesperson Howie Padilla. “DPS is actively working to review and process the data involved in this request. While we recognize that this process has taken longer than anticipated, it is critical to ensure that the information provided is accurate, complete and complies with all applicable

By failing to provide the data in a timely manner, the Public Record Media suit asserts that the state is in violation of the Data Practices Act and seeks the records, an injunction against the agency to compel compliance with the law, as well as court costs and penalties. It was filed in Ramsey County District Court and names the Department of Public Safety and its current commissioner, Bob Jacobson.

Related | ‘Outside agitator’ narrative by Walz, community leaders was wrong but helped quell 2020 George Floyd protests

The lawsuit was filed by attorney Tim Phillips, who is donating his time to Public Record Media, Ehling said. 

Ehling said the lack of response displayed in this request fits a pattern he and others have seen with the Walz Administration’s government transparency practices. Requests, they claim, often languish or are fulfilled after hyper-technical interpretations of the request and the law in ways that limit what is produced.

“We have seen these kinds of problems growing over time, especially in this administration,” Ehling said. “The Walz Administration seems to be very focused on so-called narrative control, as people say in the P.R. business. Delaying until the news window has passed, or not giving out information that in our opinion they should.

“And it’s bleeding over into a lot of other government entities, too, which is unfortunate.”

Walz press secretary Claire Lancaster said this in response: “We take government transparency seriously. Our office has provided tens of thousands of pages of data and have added staff and technology to more quickly respond to data requests. We also have to carefully review these requests to ensure we comply with the law and protect employees’ personal information and sensitive government data.”

Walz’s nomination for vice president on the ticket of Kamala Harris has increased public and media interest in the performance of his administration, including the response to the civil unrest following the murder of Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. It was after the VP pick that Public Record Media decided to push harder to have its two-year-old request fulfilled.

“We also seek to learn more, not only the decision making of top state officials including Gov. Walz during a consequential moment in recent Minnesota history, but we also want to learn why this simple data request has been stalled for over two years,” Ehling said.

Peter Callaghan

Peter Callaghan covers state government for MinnPost. Follow him on Twitter @CallaghanPeter or email him at pcallaghan@minnpost.com.

The post Group sues state agency over documents related to aftermath of George Floyd murder appeared first on MinnPost.

Following the shooting of four children in a stolen car less than two weeks ago, Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) Chief Brian O’Hara and Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty have been publicly going back and forth about who is to blame. 

The chief claims investigators are arresting kids for auto theft and referring them to the county attorney’s office, while Moriarty claims her office isn’t getting the referrals. The back and forth, which has been simmering for months, was sparked by a shooting on Aug. 18 when four kids between the ages of 11 and 14 were shot while riding in a stolen vehicle. 

During this exchange, O’Hara also cited a specific statute, saying the reason he couldn’t bring charges against many juveniles is due to a state law that says any individual under 14 years old is incapable of committing a crime, leaving his officers’ hands tied on juvenile crime. 

“We are failing to deter this behavior, and with that being said, we are failing these kids as well,” O’Hara said during a news conference shortly after the shooting. 

Moriarty’s office released a statement in response, calling O’Hara “inaccurate” and laying out several other ways law enforcement could refer juveniles 10 years old and older to her office, including their Youth Auto Theft Early Intervention Initiative. 

The initiative was created last year due to officers telling Moriarty’s office they knew the kids involved in thefts but didn’t have enough to charge. The initiative involves youth and their families accepting voluntary services from a social worker in an effort to prevent kids from stealing cars in the future. About 81% of juveniles who went through the initiative had no new cases submitted, but MPD has only referred four cases to her office in the second and third quarters of this year to date, according to her office. 

“This is critically important given the low clearance rate of 1.4% in 2024 for auto theft cases in Minneapolis,” Moriarty said in the statement. “Police often tell us they know who is involved but do not have the evidence to prove it.”

Rachel Moran, University of St. Thomas School of Law professor and founder of the school’s Criminal and Juvenile Defense Clinic, said while both O’Hara and Moriarty are accusing each other of inaccuracies, they’re both “not hearing exactly what the other is saying.”

“Chief O’Hara is right that these kids can’t be charged as adults … Mary Moriarty is right that there are other ways that they can be charged with delinquency offenses, and that there are ways to certainly refer the kids for charges, even if they wouldn’t be charged as adults and even if they might not be held with detention,” Moran said. “They’re both kind of at odds with each other over nuances in their language, but I think the ultimate gist of it is they don’t perceive the other as cooperating with their goal.”

Related | ShotSpotter to stay put in Minneapolis as officials negotiate extension, expansion

Moran said these types of exchanges happen often when a county attorney, labeled as progressive or wants to take a more rehabilitative approach, and police chief have different notions of public safety. And while they appear at odds with each other, violent crime being down overall shows each of their efforts could have merit, she said. 

“A terrible incident like what happened … is obviously going to create a lot of public attention and tension, and so words fly, but the reality is that I think to some extent, each of their approaches may be working,” she said. “Not perfectly, and this is an example of something not working, but the path forward certainly would be helpful to have them more on the same page.”

Mohamed Ibrahim

Mohamed Ibrahim is MinnPost’s environment and public safety reporter. He can be reached at mibrahim@minnpost.com.

The post Police and prosecutors in Minneapolis grapple with youth ‘incapable’ of committing crime appeared first on MinnPost.