Probe begun after George Floyd’s death finds discrimination by Minneapolis police

ST. PAUL, Minn. — The Minneapolis Police Division has engaged in a sample of race discrimination for a minimum of the previous decade, together with stopping and arresting Blacks at the next price than whites, utilizing power extra usually on folks of coloration and sustaining a tradition the place racist language is tolerated, a state investigation launched after George Floyd’s killing discovered.

The report launched Wednesday by the Minnesota Division of Human Rights following a virtually two-year investigation mentioned the company and town would negotiate a consent decree to handle the issue, with enter from residents, officers, metropolis employees and others.

The report mentioned police division information “demonstrates vital racial disparities with respect to officers’ use of power, site visitors stops, searches, citations, and arrests.” And it mentioned officers “used covert social media to surveil Black people and Black organizations, unrelated to legal exercise, and preserve an organizational tradition the place some officers and supervisors use racist, misogynistic, and disrespectful language with impunity.”

Human Rights Commissioner Rebecca Lucero mentioned throughout a information convention after the report was launched that it doesn’t single out any officers or metropolis leaders.

“This investigation isn’t about one particular person or one incident,” Lucero mentioned.

Requested how lengthy the consent decree may take, Lucero mentioned, “So long as it takes to do it proper.”

The report mentioned town and police division “don’t want to attend to institute quick adjustments to start to handle the causes of discrimination that weaken the Metropolis’s public security system and hurt neighborhood members.” It listed a number of steps that town can take now, together with implementing stronger inner oversight to carry officers accountable for his or her conduct, higher coaching, and higher communication with the general public about important incidents reminiscent of officer-involved shootings.

Nationwide civil rights lawyer Ben Crump and his companions, who gained a $27 million settlement from town for the Floyd household, referred to as the report “historic” and “monumental in its significance.” They mentioned they have been “grateful and deeply hopeful” that change is imminent.

“We name on metropolis, state, and Police leaders to just accept the problem of those findings and make significant change eventually to create belief between communities of coloration in Minneapolis and people who are sworn to guard and serve them,” the attorneys mentioned in an announcement.

The Division of Human Rights launched its investigation barely per week after Floyd’s demise on Might 25, 2020. Then-Officer Derek Chauvin used his knee to pin the Black man to the pavement for 9 1/2 minutes in a case that sparked protests world wide towards police racism and brutality. Chauvin, who’s white, was convicted final spring of homicide. Three different fired officers — Tou Thao, Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng — have been convicted this yr of violating Floyd’s civil rights in a federal trial and so they face a state trial beginning in June.

State investigators reviewed a decade’s price of knowledge, together with information on site visitors stops, searches, arrests and makes use of of power, and examined insurance policies and coaching. The assessment included round 700 hours of physique digital camera video and practically 480,000 pages of metropolis and police division paperwork. Lucero mentioned investigators interviewed officers all through the division and “overwhelmingly, we discovered officers being very forthcoming.” The investigators additionally invited residents to submit their very own tales of encounters with Minneapolis police.

The Minnesota Division of Human Rights is the state’s civil rights enforcement company. Its duties embrace imposing the Minnesota Human Rights Act which, amongst different issues, makes it unlawful for a police division to discriminate towards somebody due to their race.

“Race-based policing is illegal and particularly harms folks of coloration and Indigenous people — generally costing neighborhood members their lives,” the report mentioned.

The division has come underneath stress from a number of instructions since Floyd’s demise. The U.S. Division of Justice can be investigating Minneapolis policing practices, although it’s not considered near a conclusion.

A number of Metropolis Council members and residents have pushed to exchange the division with a brand new public security unit that they argue may take a extra complete public well being method to policing, together with dropping a required minimal variety of law enforcement officials. Voters rejected the concept final yr.

Mayor Jacob Frey and Chief Medaria Arradondo, earlier than his retirement in January, additionally made a spread of adjustments in division insurance policies and practices, together with requiring officers to doc their makes an attempt to de-escalate conditions, and now not stopping motorists for minor site visitors violations.

However neighborhood anger at police flared anew in February when law enforcement officials serving a no-knock warrant shot and killed Amir Locke, a 22-year-old Black man who was staying on a sofa in his cousin’s residence. Prosecutors declined to cost the officer who shot Locke, saying physique digital camera video confirmed him pointing a gun on the officer, a declare his household disputed. Town has since banned no-knock warrants besides in essentially the most excessive circumstances, reminiscent of a hostage state of affairs.

Ibrahim is a corps member for the Related Press/Report for America Statehouse Information Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit nationwide service program that locations journalists in native newsrooms to report on undercovered points.