Policing
September 10, 2022 — Scott Johnson
We have followed the fate of law enforcement in Minneapolis since the death of Saint George Floyd on Memorial Day 2020. We have also followed the related media coverage, which has amplified and confused the multifarious racial issues. As the Minneapolis Police Department has contracted to the size of a shrunken head — a shrunken head capable of scaring no one — we have repeatedly asked who in his right
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July 21, 2022 — Scott Johnson
The authorities have released an edited video of bodycam footage from Minneapolis police officers who responded to Arabella Foss-Yarbrough’s 911 call for help last week. Officers killed Tekle Sundberg after he shot up Yarbrough’s apartment and resisted police in a six-hour standoff. John and I have been following the story on Power Line. Pafoua Yang has covered it for Alpha News. Based on her own sources, Pafoua reported earlier this
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July 19, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Officers of the Minneapolis Police Department killed Tekle Sundberg after he shot up Cassandra Yarbrough’s apartment and resisted police in a six-hour standoff. John summarized the events here. The odious Ben Crump is on the case. It has turned into a national story. The Star Tribune updates it here this morning. Rebecca Brannon’s Twitter account alerts us to the Townhall column by Julio Rosas. Minneapolis Police are pushing back against
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July 18, 2022 — Scott Johnson
John covered our current local cause célèbre last night in “The victim speaks.” You know Minneapolis is suffering another meltdown if attorney Ben Crump is on the scene. While all the facts behind the hours-long standoff that preceded Tekle Sundberg’s death are not yet clear, Crump wants to agitate the mob. Minneapolis Police Department officers gave their PROMISE to Tekle Sundberg's parents that their son's mental health crisis would NOT
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July 11, 2022 — Scott Johnson
John noted the local July 4 crime spree in “War zone Minneapolis.” Where were the police? At Alpha News Pafoua Yang reports “MPD had 80 officers to respond to 1,300 calls Monday night.” “MPD” is the Minneapolis Police Department. “Monday night” was the evening of July 4. For some reason or other, the MPD is stretched a little thin. Today’s Star Tribune carries the Andy Mannix/Jeff Hargarten story “‘We’re in
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June 26, 2022 — Scott Johnson
I’ve been mocking the Star Tribune on a daily basis for holding its editorial tongue on the Minnesota Supreme Court order requiring the city to comply with its charter. Today the Star Tribune speaks in the editorial “Ruling should end cop funding nonsense.” Subhead: “Minnesota Supreme Court rightly decides that Minneapolis must follow its charter requirements.” The editorial lays out the indisputable basics. It stops short of considering why the
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June 25, 2022 — Scott Johnson
The Minnesota Supreme Court order in Spann v. Minneapolis City Council this past Monday highlights facts salient to the future of Minneapolis. The Minneapolis Police Department has lost 300 officers since the summer of Saint George just two years ago — about one-third of the force. The city is obligated by its own charter to maintain a police department of 731 officers. Yet the city now maintains the department with
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June 23, 2022 — Scott Johnson
I have turned to today’s Star Tribune to check out the editorial board’s take on Monday’s Minnesota Supreme Court ruling against the city in Spann v. Minneapolis City Council. The city is short some 100 police officers of the minimum imposed by its own charter and has no prospect of coming into compliance any time soon. Even were it to achieve compliance, another 100 officers will leave the city short
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June 22, 2022 — Scott Johnson
On Monday the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled 7-0 that the Minneapolis mayor had breached his duty to staff the police department at the minimum level specified by the city charter. (The Supreme Court also ruled that the city council was in compliance with the related funding requirement.) For some reason or other, the police department has “lost” 300 officers since the summer of George Floyd. The city is now some
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June 21, 2022 — Scott Johnson
The Minneapolis city charter requires the city to fund and employ a minimum number of police officers, yet the city resisted its legal obligation all the way to the Minnesota Supreme Court. Yesterday the Court ruled unanimously that the city’s resistance to its legal obligation lacked merit. I have embedded Chief Justice Gildea’s 9-page order at the bottom of this post. Five of the Court’s seven justices, by the way,
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June 20, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Kyle Hooten recently rode along with the Minneapolis police during its Operation Safe Summer operation. Kyle briefly covered his ride-along in the Alpha News story here. The video is below. Minneapolis has fallen into a deep, deep hole with an undermanned and demoralized police department, an empowered criminal class, and an ineffectual judicial system. Over the past two years, the Minneapolis Police Department has lost almost 300 officers. Any sentient
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June 13, 2022 — Steven Hayward
Nothing so fully exposes the dream world of the left, in which good intentions and sentiments are thought sufficient to make reality bend to their will, than the enthusiasm for “re-imagining policing” that went along with the “Defund the Police” mania post-George Floyd. If we just “re-imagine” something, it will happen! We don’t even need to close our eyes and click our heels! And one of the leading ideas was
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June 10, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Alpha News reporter Liz Collin rode along with law enforcement — undercover officers from the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office Carjacking Auto Theft Team — for a look at the hot rod/street racing burnouts and getaways that have become a deadly threat all over Minneapolis and St. Paul (video below). The name of the unit denotes the frequent use of stolen cars in the burnouts. As Liz reports, although the street
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June 3, 2022 — Scott Johnson
The Minnesota Department of Human Rights has filed a 72-page charge of discrimination over a period of 10 years against the Minneapolis Police Department. I commented critically on the charge along with a link to the charge itself in “Who will speak for the MPD?” We have yet to see any of the 480,000 pages of documents and other evidence gathered by the department in the course of its investigation.
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May 26, 2022 — Scott Johnson
Barack Obama remembers George Floyd on the second anniversary of his passing (tweet below). He doesn’t want to let our current focus on the Uvalde massacre distract us from attention to the anniversary and the shibboleth of “reimagining policing.” Obama puts me in mind of John Lennon: “Reimagine there’s no police. It’s easy if you try.” If you visit Minneapolis, by the way, you won’t have to do much in
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May 26, 2022 — Scott Johnson
As reporters ascertain what happened during the tragic school shooting in Uvalde, we have more to process. The Associated Press has reconstructed events outside the school during the shooting before and after the heroic Border Patrol agent entered the building. The AP story is “Onlookers urged police to charge into Texas school.” The story opens: Frustrated onlookers urged police officers to charge into the Texas elementary school where a gunman’s
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May 23, 2022 — Scott Johnson
I wrote about the massive discrimination charge filed by the Minnesota Department of Human Rights against the Minneapolis Police Department on April 28 in “Who will speak for the MPD?” I noted in an update later that morning that I filed a request for inspection of the underlying documents under the Minnesota Data Practices Act. The Department of Human Rights denied my request in a response dated May 10 that
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