- Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, was shot after a traffic stop by an officer who police say mistook her gun for a Taser. The shooting, which occurred in a Minneapolis suburb, happened on the 10th day of the Derek Chauvin trial and touched off a wave of protests and demonstrations Monday. [USA Today / Ryan W. Miller, Elinor Aspegren, and Eric Ferkenhoff]
- Wright and his girlfriend were initially pulled over by police after they noticed his car had expired tags. He called his mother to ask for the family’s insurance information as the officers discovered he had an outstanding arrest warrant. [NPR / Becky Sullivan]
- After talking with one of the officers, Wright exited the car and turned his back to the officer to be handcuffed. He later appeared to move his hands out of the way and duck back into the car. That’s when the other officer, still unnamed by Minneapolis police, ran toward Wright and drew her handgun, firing once. [CNN / Adrienne Broaddus, Holly Yan, Keith Allen, and Hollie Silverman]
- “I’ll Tase you! I’ll Tase you! Taser! Taser! Taser!” the officer was shouting on bodycam footage released during a police press conference. After she fired the shot, with Wright now at the wheel, the car sped into oncoming traffic and crashed. “Holy shit! I shot him,” she said next. [AP / Mohamed Ibrahim]
- The shooting comes at a tense time for the Minneapolis region as the trial of Derek Chauvin enters its third week. George Floyd was killed just miles away from Brooklyn Center, the city suburb where Wright was killed in what Police Chief Tim Gannon termed an “accidental discharge.” [NBC News / Rachel Elbaum and Caroline Radnofsky]
- The shooting recenters the debate on ending pretext traffic stops, which allow officers to investigate motorists for serious crimes despite only pulling them over for smaller traffic violations. Pretextual traffic stops have been shown to have a clear racial bias. [Pew Research Center/ Marsha Mercer]
- When asked about the shooting, President Joe Biden said he’d been briefed by law enforcement and called for calm throughout the city. "And the fact is that, you know, we do know that the anger, pain and trauma that exists in the Black community in that environment is real. It's serious and it's consequential. But it will not justify violence and/or looting," Biden said. [CNN / Maegan Vazquez]
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