She pleaded an error “in the midst of chaos”. Thursday, the ex-policewoman who had killed young African-American Daunte Wright last spring, near Minneapolis, was convicted of manslaughter. The jury considered that Kim Potter, who said to have confused his service weapon with his Taser, showed “serious negligence”. The ex-policewoman will be fixed on her sentence on February 18.
Technically, she was convicted of two homicide charges, each punishable by 15 and 10 years in prison. But in Minneapolis, sentences are served in parallel – so only the longest really matters. The justice of this State operates on the principle of a scale recommended according to the criminal past of a convicted person. Kim Potter having no history, the grid recommends between 6 and 8 and a half years in prison. Prosecutors, however, said they would ask the judge for a heavier exemplary sentence.
“Overwhelming remorse and regret”
“Her remorse and regret for this incident is overwhelming,” her lawyer Paul Engh said after the verdict, asking the judge to release her on bail. “She is in no way a danger to the public,” he said.
On April 11, 2021, the policewoman was on patrol with a colleague who had decided to check the driver of a white Buick who had committed a minor traffic violation. After realizing that he was the subject of an arrest warrant, they wanted to arrest him. The policewoman described the situation that day as “potentially dangerous”. Daunte Wright, who was unarmed, did not allow himself to be handcuffed and restarted his car to flee. Kim Potter then unsheathed his weapon, explaining then having believed to take hold of his electric pistol.
“We were fighting to prevent him from fleeing and then it became chaos. I remember shouting ‘Taser, Taser, Taser’ and nothing happened. And he (his colleague) told me that I had shot him, ”she told the stand Friday, before bursting into tears.
The “relieved” family
In a statement sent to the American media, the family of the victim said Thursday “relieved” that “accounts have been made for this absurd death”. The day of Daunte Wright’s death “will remain a trauma for her family and yet another example for America of why we desperately need to change policing practices,” wrote her relatives.
While reading the verdict, her mother, Katie Wright, felt “all the emotions you can imagine”. “Accountability is not justice”, however qualified at the exit of the hearing the Attorney General of the State of Minnesota, Keith Ellison, a Democrat. “Justice would be to bring Daunte back to life and make the Wright family whole again. Justice is out of reach, ”he regretted.
The death of the young man had particularly moved the United States because it had intervened in the middle of the trial of the white police officer Derek Chauvin who, in May 2020 in Minneapolis, killed the black forty-something George Floyd. Gatherings enamelled with violence had taken place several nights in a row in Brooklyn Center before the arrest of Kim Potter calmed down.