It Appears that Black Lives Don’t Matter

After being convicted of manslaughter for shooting Daunte Wright, Kim Potter is sentenced to only 2 years in prison.

This means that she will probably be out in 14 months.

We need to hold cops to a higher standard than the general public, because they have societal permission to, and a specific expertise in, the application deadly force.

To quote Stan Lee, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

The former police officer who fatally shot Daunte Wright during a traffic stop was sentenced to two years in prison on Friday, far less than the standard of about seven years for manslaughter, after a judge said leniency was warranted because the officer had meant to fire her Taser and not her gun.

Jurors convicted the former officer, Kimberly Potter, on two counts of manslaughter in December. They found that she had acted recklessly when she fired a bullet into Mr. Wright’s chest after warning that she was going to stun him and yelling: “Taser! Taser! Taser!”

Ms. Potter, a 49-year-old white woman who served on the police force in Brooklyn Center, Minn., resigned two days after the shooting in April, during a time of chaotic protests over the killing of Mr. Wright, a 20-year-old Black man. She has been imprisoned since the guilty verdict on Dec. 23.

Judge Regina M. Chu sentenced Ms. Potter on only the most serious count, first-degree manslaughter, in accordance with Minnesota law. The state’s sentencing guidelines list the felony count as having a presumptive punishment of a little more than seven years in prison, though the maximum penalty is 15 years. Judge Chu said the case was far different from most manslaughter cases, as well as from other high-profile police killings.

………

It is quite likely that Ms. Potter will be released from prison after about 14 months, in April 2023. Under Minnesota law, prisoners are generally freed on a supervised release term after they serve two-thirds of their sentence, and Ms. Potter will be credited for the 58 days she has spent in custody since she was convicted.

The message here from law enforcement here is, “There is no justice, there is just us.”