Repercussions At A Personal Level

The killing of Daunte Wright is subsumed by the fact that he was an unarmed young black man who shouldn’t have been shot, shouldn’t have died. There can be no dispute about this. But that doesn’t mean that all other facts and circumstances cease to exist, unless the only thing that matters is that it happened. And to some, that’s certainly the case, Wright’s death coming during the Derek Chauvin trial, following almost immediately upon the stop of Lt. Caron Nazaio. and all within miles of each other.

Twenty-six year police officer Kimberly Potter has been charged with manslaughter 2 upon her claim that she thought she was firing her Taser when she fired her service weapon and killed Wright. There are arguments that cut both ways as to the veracity of her claim, though there is no reason why she would have wanted to kill him rather than prevent him from fleeing after being stopped for expired tags and having an open warrant in an armed robbery case. The man 2 charge tells us that its premised on the reckless mistake of shooting her gun rather than the Taser. And, indeed, if that’s what happened, it would seem quite likely that she was reckless.

But these people, these incidents, reflect the “rage” of those for whom one word answers say all they need to know. There’s another guy, who happens to be a black guy too, who got caught in a different kind of crossfire here, although nobody really cares much about him. His name is Curt Boganey. He was the city manager of Brooklyn Center, “was” being the operative word, and he was responsible or overseeing the police.

Brooklyn Center leaders were poised to fire the city’s police chief Monday evening, following the police shooting of a 20-year-old Black man Sunday afternoon that touched off a night of unrest in the city.

At an emergency afternoon meeting, the City Council voted to give authority over the police department to the mayor’s office and to fire City Manager Curt Boganey, who’d been with the city since 2005, Council Member Dan Ryan said during a virtual council workshop.

Did the police chief do anything wrong? Could he have done anything different that would have changed what happened here? No matter, and the chief, Tim Gannon, quit because there was no reason to stay. The chief was a big step away from Potter, but he had to be thrown under the bus. And Boganey, the city manager, was a giant leap away from the chief. So why did he had to go too?

At a virtual council workshop, Council Member Kris Lawrence-Anderson said she voted to remove the city manager because she feared for her property and retaliation by protestors if she had voted to keep him.

“He was doing a great job. I respect him dearly,” she said. “I didn’t want repercussions at a personal level.”

The weapon of mob violence is fear. From what the national media shows, there are protests which appear “mostly peaceful” and police trying to silence the protesters using gas and rubber bullets, what comes off as a unjustified use of force against people exercising their constitutional right to protest. Yet Curt Boganey, who had nothing to do with what happened to Daunte Wright, was fired because a council member who thought he was doing a great job feared “retaliation by protesters if she voted to keep him.” The Star Tribune included some detail omitted from national coverage that might provide some insight as to Council Member Kris Lawrence-Anderson’s fear.

Some guard members blocked the entrance to the Shingle Creek Crossing shopping plaza in Brooklyn Center where social media posts showed looters ransacking stores and carrying off everything from printers to clothing.

What did a shopping plaza have to do with Potter’s conduct?

At the nearby Walmart, flip-flops and bottles of fruity drinks littered the parking lot where a man who gave his name as Thomas was part of a small army of store employees picking up trash and debris.

“All of our large screen TV’s were taken,” he said.

Was Walmart responsible for Daunte Wrght’s death?

Alarms blared at a Verizon store across the way where the front window was broken and a TV was ripped off the wall. Looters had ransacked the Icon Beauty Salon and left boxes of fake eyelashes behind in the parking lot. At Aspen Dental, only the front door sustained damage, but the clinic canceled all Monday appointments.

Before he quit, Chief Gannon held a press conference where he said the R-word.

“There was no riot,” one reporter responded.

“Don’t do that,” another person is heard saying, as others joined in that there wasn’t a riot.

Whether there was a riot, looting, or just “mostly peaceful” protest broken up by police using excessive force might be subject to debate, although all the offending large screen TVs at Walmarts didn’t walk off on their own. But given what’s happened, just over the past ten days, isn’t the rage understandable?

This year to April 12, 52 black people were fatally shot by police, just three of whom were unarmed, and 109 white people suffered the same fate, five of whom were unarmed, according to a Washington Post database.

Yet, City Manager Boganey was hard at work doing everything he could to placate the demands for “racial justice.”

The incident also comes as Brooklyn Center moves ahead with hiring a leader for its new Office of Anti-Racist Practices and Policies, which will review city policies and recommend changes. Before his termination was announced, Boganey had said Monday that he hoped to fill the position within a few months. The city also will continue with its anti-racism training for staff and City Council members.

It didn’t save Boganey’s job because a City Council member feared personal retribution from the mostly peaceful mob. You’ll know the winners and losers of this battle because the losers get fired and the winners get new big screen TVs, but nobody is allowed to mention such things and the media will surely not report it. After all, the only fact that matters is that a 20-year-old black man is dead who shouldn’t be.