“A man charged with attempted murder after firing at Minneapolis police officers in the chaotic protests that followed George Floyd’s death has been acquitted of all charges against him” on self-defense grounds, the Associated Press reported on Friday, September 3, 2021 (read story here).
Jaleel Stallings, 28, a black man, participated in the protests. Newsbreak says (here),
“On May 30, 2020, Stallings and a few others were in Minneapolis looking to join a protest. He parked his vehicle at the corner of 14th Avenue South and East Lake Street. He saw a group of marked squad cars drive by with their lights activated, assuming then all police officers would be patrolling in that manner, court documents said. Then, at about 10:52 p.m., someone ran by yelling ‘they’re shooting, they’re shooting!’ court documents state. Stallings saw a white van driving slowly with its sliding door open toward the parking lot and he heard gunshots and felt something hard hit his chest.”
Stallings returned fire, because
“he thought he was being attacked by civilians. … A curfew had been declared, and Gov. Tim Walz and other state leaders had warned about white supremacists and others wandering around Minneapolis to instigate violence. And Stallings was aware of this, which is why he armed himself (he is legally permitted to carry), court documents explain.”
Police body camera footage
“shows the MPD SWAT team members tried to hide their identity as they patrolled the streets during the unrest, didn’t warn people before they fired ‘less lethal’ [rubber bullet] rounds at them, [and later] gave false and misleading statements about what happened and changed their stories when they were presented with other evidence.”
It doesn’t appear that Stallings was a rioter or looter. In any case, the MPD cops were just randomly shooting at protesters. “There have been numerous complaints and lawsuits filed by innocent bystanders who were struck and in some cases blinded by police munitions during the protests,” Newsbreak said.
A witness, Sheila Nazheed, who’s currently running for Minneapolis mayor, tweeted after Stallings’ acquittal, “I didn’t need [an] exposé to know MPD was uncritically shooting protestors. I was there on the streets as a medic.”
The Associated Press report says,
“Stallings’ case drew new attention this week when an online digital news outlet, Minnesota Reformer, reported on his acquittal and examined the case in depth. The Reformer published body camera footage of his arrest that shows Minneapolis SWAT officers punching and kicking Stallings as he lay on the ground. A booking photo of Stallings taken after his arrest shows visible facial injuries.”
Part of the video is posted below. More video may become available later, as “Stallings is now seeking the court’s permission to allow him to release body camera footage that became public evidence during trial,” the Associated Press said.
Police are supposed to be impartial law enforcers and protectors. But it’s no secret that in many cities some of the cops are violent, racist, and lie in their police reports. Weeding out bad cops is no easy task, but eliminating entire police departments would leave communities vulnerable to crime, violence, and anarchy. There isn’t an easy solution.
Part of it is weeding out bad cops, one cop at a time. Police agencies in general need more oversight, more rigorous recruit screening, and better training and supervision. There also needs to be greater accountability, and the role of police unions must be limited to defending their members in disciplinary proceedings, not running that process or dictating outcomes.
The jury verdict in Stallings’ case doesn’t necessarily send any particular message. The jurors simply did their job. They weighed the evidence, applied the law, and determined the facts of the case supported his self-defense claim.
If there is a message in this verdict, it’s this: Any time a jury decides a citizen acted in self-defense by shooting at cops, that’s one seriously dysfunctional police department, and the police chief has a lot of work to do.