In the Damond shooting

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has turned over its file in the shooting of Justine Damond by Minneapolis Police Officer Mohamed Noor to Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman. (Digression: Freeman is the son of former Minnesota Governor and JFK Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman. On the desk I am working at, I have a photograph of my father checking Orville Freeman in to a room at the Comstock Hotel in Moorhead, Minnesota in 1956 or so. Freeman would have been governor at the time.) We await Mike Freeman’s charging decision in this apparently outrageous case.

It’s an important case. Justice is due the friends and family of Ms. Damond, but the case is important for another reason as well. It opens one more window onto the Minneapolis kakistocracy. However bad its governance is at the moment, however, it is destined to get worse following municipal elections next month.

Today’s Star Tribune carries a story by Adam Belz on the strained relationship between Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges and former Minneapolis Police Chief Janee Harteau. Belz reports toward the bottom of the story:

When the BCA said July 18 that Noor shot from the squad car and Damond was unarmed, Harteau said she realized the full weight of the situation, because Noor’s partner, Officer Matthew Harrity, offered no defense of the shooting. “It was clear to me that he didn’t know why this happened,” Harteau said.

It’s been a while since I wrote about the shooting of Justine Damond. I may be mistaken, but I don’t recall seeing this reported before. If so, I think Belz has “buried the lede,” as they say.

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