The conviction of former Minnesota police officer Kim Potter for manslaughter brought closure for the family of Duante Wright and many in our society. The fact, however, is that it will not bring closure on the long-standing debate over the criminalization of negligence in weapon confusion cases.
Many predicted that the largely white jury would deliver racial injustice. As with the jury in the murder trial of Ahmaud Arbery, these jurors showed again that they exhibit the objectivity and integrity too often missing in our commentators and politicians. The question is not whether the jury got the law right but whether the law itself is wrong in its vague criteria.
This is the latest “weapons confusion” case and the jury understandably found it difficult to find that Potter “consciously disregarded” the risks to Duante Wright when she grabbed her service weapon rather than her Taser. The case highlights the problem with criminalized negligence standards, particularly in these weapon confusion cases. The question is whether justice is truly served by applying criminal laws to acts of negligence by officers in these cases.
There was no question in the case that Potter made a terrible and fatal mistake. It is also clear that she did so unintentionally. She called out, consistent with her training, “Taser, Taser, Taser” before firing her service weapon by mistake. She was then shown collapsing at the scene, sobbing that she killed Wright by mistake. The prosecutors did not question that she thought she was grabbing her Taser but demanded a long criminal sentence under the ambiguous standard of involuntary manslaughter.
Potter faced two charges. Under first-degree manslaughter, the prosecution has to prove that Potter caused someone’s death while committing or attempting to commit a lesser crime (in this case reckless handling or use of a firearm). The second charge of second-degree manslaughter requires a showing that she causing someone’s death through culpable negligence, by creating an unreasonable risk and consciously taking chances of causing death or great bodily harm.
Both charges are being used to criminalize an undeniable and unintended act. The only real dividing line between negligence and manslaughter is the ill-defined element of “conscious disregard” of a risk. That standard is fine in some cases where the act itself was intended despite the risks. When someone drives through a crowd at high speed, there is a conscious disregard of the risk even if the person does not want to hit anyone.
There is a tendency to treat criminal law as the only way to address fatal tragedies. Yet, there are many cases where tragic injuries or deaths occur without criminal charges. Torts, which I have taught for three decades, often involve wrongful deaths where people are held civilly, not criminally liable. When a physician causes the death of a patient through malpractice or a company causes the death of a consumer through a product defect, the injuries are generally addressed through tort, not criminal, liability.
It is worth continuing to discuss this case in terms of whether weapons confusion cases should be handled as torts. For some of these jurors, the criminal framing may have felt disconnected from reality. The jury saw an officer who made a mistake on videotape as officers attempted to arrest a struggling suspect, a mistake where the officer expressed immediate and continuing guilt. Some jurors were initially unwilling to treat that mistake as manslaughter.
These cases have always left these same questions lingering in their aftermath. Consider the 2009 case where Bay Area Rapid Transit officers struggled with Oscar Grant to arrest him. With Grant on the ground, BART officer Johannes Mehserle also warned that he was about to use a Taser but then grabbed his service weapon and fired a fatal round into Grant’s back. Unlike Potter, Mehserle could be seen in the videotape moving his thumb over his weapon as you would to release a safety on the Taser. (His service weapon did not have that type of safety release). The Taser in the Mehserle was shaped more like a service weapon (though it was also lighter and yellow).
The jury clearly struggled with the criminalization of Mehserle’s obvious unintentional act. It rejected second-degree murder or voluntary manslaughter charges but found him guilty of involuntary manslaughter. He was sentenced to two years.
There is also the case of volunteer sheriff’s deputy, Robert Bates, in Oklahoma in 2015. Bates meant to use his Taser on Eric Harris, who was being held down by other officers in 2015. He insisted that this was a case of weapon confusion that “has happened a number of times around the country. … You must believe me, it can happen to anyone.” The jury however convicted him of second-degree manslaughter and sentenced him to four years in prison.
Conversely, in 2019, St. Louis police officer, Julia Crews, mistakenly grabbed her service revolver rather than her Taser and shot a suspected shoplifter, Ashley Hall. Crews resigned like Potter after the incident. However, the charge of second-degree assault was eventually dropped (with the support of Hall) in exchange for participation in a restorative justice mediation. Separately, the city of Ladue agreed to a $2 million settlement with Hall.
Jurors have struggled with the use of these provisions for decades as prosecutors demand that they ignore both their empathies and their common sense. What is left for some jurors is not criminal justice, for a type of strict liability for officers.
There is ample deterrence for officers not to commit such mistakes beyond the obvious desire not to take a life. Officers in these cases often face termination and prolonged civil litigation. The relatively low number of these cases (in light of the thousands of Taser discharges) shows that most officers show that such confusion is rare but will likely occur on occasion. It is not clear that these mistakes will be decreased further by criminalizing these mistakes. Since these cases are not intentional, officers are not making some calculus of risk for a criminal act.
Officers often make mistakes. We have had officers fire dozens or even hundreds of rounds that endanger others or engage in high-speed chases over relatively minor offenses. Those cases are rarely treated as criminal rather than civil matters. The same should be true for weapon confusion cases and states should narrow the language in these laws by excluding such cases or clarifying the necessary showing for culpability beyond negligence.
The jury was told by the court to follow the law and it did so to its best judgment. The question is whether the law itself needs to be reviewed before we have another weapon confusion case.
I’ve never been at firearms use-of-force training, and it probably differs place-to-place. But, there needs to be much more emphasis on disabling techniques, and letting “neutralizing the threat” (how’s that for dehumanizing language?) pass into obsolescence.
I’ll give two examples. Cops are trained to aim for center chest (center back), which is a kill shot. At 10-20′ distance, that doctrine makes sense in terms of disabling, and not hitting an unintended target if you miss. In this case and the Jacob Blake case, the firearm is being used at point blank distance. That means that there is aiming choice. You can disable a person’s arm from operating a weapon by shooting shoulder, scapula or upper arm. You can disable a leg from operating the gas pedal of a vehicle with a shot to the thigh or knee.
Why aren’t police trained in disabling firearm use at close distances? And who decided that to disable a vehicle, you shoot the driver rather than shoot out the tire(s)? These are particularly germane questions when dealing with an unarmed person.
So, I think Potter is paying for decades of police firearms doctrine that is life-dismissive (based on kill shots). That’s an area of where improvements are not only possible, but overdue.
pbinca: “So, I think Potter is paying for decades of police firearms doctrine that is life-dismissive (based on kill shots). That’s an area of where improvements are not only possible, but overdue..”
+++
When you pull the weapon you have already put yourself in the ready to kill situation. A few decades ago a couple of bank robbers were caught by an FBI squad in Florida and there was a shootout. Most of the FBI squad was wiped out by two guys who had already been mortally hit by gunfire. They were dying but they were still able to kill their opponents. If you have made the decision to shoot then shooting to wound is stupid. A badly, even fatally, wounded thug can still kill you. An FBI team could tell you that, but they are dead.
pbinca:
If the situation does not warrant deadly force, then a cop does not have the right to shoot someone. They could shoot someone in the leg, and they could bleed out.
It is my understanding that they shoot center mass to stop the threat. It can take multiple fatal wounds before someone fighting, for instance on drugs, actually stops. Those are fatal wounds. If someone’s walking down the street and they get shot in the leg, they might collapse in shock. If someone is high on drugs, or pumped up on adrenaline, fighting, then they’ll keep fighting.
If deadly force is not warranted, such as for a suspect who is resisting and struggling, then non lethal would be used. Like a Taser.
@pbinca
You’ve never been either in a physical confrontation, or used a weapon, have you?
In most physical confrontations, you don’t have time to think it through, what you do is instinctive, and designed to save your life, sometimes as with police officers, with the benefit of training. However, things happen so rapidly that mistakes are virtually guaranteed. The bottom line is that at the end of it all, you walk away. YOU walk away, NOT the other guy.
Speaking personally from experience, I have walked away from several people who were laying on the ground unconscious and needed an ambulance… The alternative was for me to be lying there, and that just wasn’t gonna happen.
I make no apologies for protecting my life in those circumstances. Neither should this woman be punished for doing what she had to do, and having made a mistake in the process process of doing it.
Let’s remember, the man she shot was not only a criminal, he had an outstanding warrant. He was attempting to escape and in the process of doing so was endangering the life of another police officer.
His death was no loss to society.
Canuck: “You’ve never been either in a physical confrontation, or used a weapon, have you?”
+××
Yeah, that’s what I thought about him too, never been in a fight or fast moving dangerous situation.
Nobody’s life was in danger in this case. Officer Johnson had the passenger door open, and was reaching in — the correct way to do it so you can retreat instantly if the car starts rolling. He even had time to retreat and close the passenger door to protect the passenger from falling out.
Officer Potter was the trainer that day, and went way out of her lane. Officer Lucky was handling Wright, and was gradually getting Wright to put one leg out of the car at the moment Potter shot Wright, ejecting a casing in the face of Officer Lucky and likely deafening him. I agree that Wright acted recklessly, but then so did Potter. Both are paying the price for their rash decisionmaking.
As Canuck and I were saying– your comment is uninformed by any real experience and it shows. You would be lauded by academics and probably mocked by police or military. Good that you are thinking about it though.
pbinca: A felon with a knife charging at a cop leaves the cop little choice. These are split-second decisions. Aiming takes more than a split second. It’s not just cops who are trained to kill. Fifth rule of gun handling for all gun owners: Never point the gun at anything you don’t intend to destroy. The innocent public may not know that, but I guarantee all felons do. This wasn’t Wright’s first rodeo.
Sorry typos:
I agree mostly with you Ralph.
I’ve thought ever sense the Tazer came out cops shouldn’t carry it or a bunch of non-lethal crap.
I feel just a baton & 45, ( if they’re big enough to hold it?)
I remember growing up everyone knew if you were Ph’in around, doing crap you shouldn’t you could get shot dead by a cop or a citizen.
I think many/most of us we’ve had enough of this Cops/Citizens have to 1st breast feed those aholes.
For decades all this type crap has been intentional to destroy support for local govt & local policing so everyone screams for some sort of Globalist policing scam from Kluas Schwab/etc., for our own good they claim.
Was she convicted of two manslaughter charged?
One person died once. If one charge had lesser sentencing then only that one applies.
Turkey? Address this issue.
Minnesota Cops should upon arriving for work tonight and tomorrow….should park their cars, go to their Chief’s Office and lay the Keys for the car, their Badges, Guns, Handcuffs, Baton, and TASERS on his desk and tell him with great clarity…..to take his job and shove it up his butt.
Everyone of them, State, County, and City…..This malicious political prosecution makes every single one of them walking targets for the very same kind of treatment.
Absolutely…..they should refuse to carry a baton or Taser…..and carry only a Firearm for their self defense.
That way there is no chance of a mistake during extreme moments of great stress and threat to the Officers safety.
If it means Thugs endangering Officer’s lives wind up getting shot dead as a first and only response then society would be better served than with what is going on today.
In the words of LtCol Jeff Cooper USMC Retired…..”“If violent crime is to be curved, it is only the intended victim who can do it. The felon does not fear the police, and he fears neither judge nor jury. Therefore what he must be taught to fear is his victim.” .
I agree mostly with you Ralph.
I’ve thought ever sense the Tazer came out cops shouldn’t carry it. I feel just a baton & 45, ( if they’re big enough to hold it?)
I remember growing up everyone knew if you were Ph’in. doing crap you should you could get shot dead by a cop or a citizen.
I think we’ve had enough of this Cops/Citizens have to 1st breast feed those aholes.
All this type crap has been intentional to destroy local govt & local policing so everyone screams for some sort of Globalist policing scam for our own good they claim now.
What would happen if we got the blue flu nationwide?
What would happen if we got the blue flu nationwide?
I say buck up. A cop’s job is no different than any other one. If you don’t like the rules than quit and find another one. It doesn’t take much to be a cop now days so it will be easy to replace you.
A practice I found prudent is for those carrying a Taser to holster it for use with their weak hand, and on the weak side of their equipment belt. The strong hand is generally for pistol/revolver and the weak hand for less-lethal such as Tasers. Unless there is a extreme corner-case need to handle both concurrently or using the opposite hand it is best to use designated hands for each weapon. That tends to minimize the chances for hazards to occur. I don’t know if it mattered in this case since I did not see how she carried her weapons on her person.
I know some will disagree with me, but I still don’t believe women should be working in many of those positions that have formerly always been male.
Just as everyone, men or women in the past couldn’t qualify to be in Special Forces or a Firemen, etc., unqualified personal can end up get people harmed or killed.
People/Citizens especially professionals & anyone that may end up on a Jury need to know the real rule book of life, that if anyone gets sloppy, just for a second or 2 that cop or citizen might be the one dead.
Below is just another of 1000’s of videos in which the cop, or could be a citizen, came close to being killed by the suspect.
**********
Officer assaulted by prisoner at Miami-Dade Police headquarters
By Joe Roetz
December 22, 2021
https://wsvn.com/news/local/officer-assaulted-by-prisoner-at-miami-dade-police-headquarters/
****************
Yea maybe those politicians calling for defunding Law Enforce should just have their Sheriffs & PDs go out for some Blue Flu:
********
Democrat US Rep. Mary Scanlon Carjacked and Robbed at Gunpoint in South Philly District in Broad Daylight
By Jim Hoft
Published December 22, 2021 at 4:18pm
590 Comments
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/12/democrat-us-rep-mary-scanlon-carjacked-robbed-gunpoint-south-philly-district-broad-daylight/
When a physician causes the death of a patient through malpractice or company causes the death of a consumer through a product defect, the injuries are generally addressed through tort, not criminal, liability.
Not everyone should be a physician nor a cop. Given who we are treating and policing these days, the public is lucky to have anyone treat their self-inflicted malady or a cop responds to a 911 call. The time will come, and it is approaching more quickly with each passing year, that no physician and no cop will care to intervene.
“People will do what they do”
– Nancy Pelosi
criminalization of negligence WTF tell that to the truck driver who got 110 years.
Maybe the jury struggled with letting her go free without any consequences for using deadly force against someone who was not posing a direct threat, and for not double-checking before hitting the trigger. Why should she go free when she took a life unnecessarily and through her own fault? I didn’t follow the trial closely, but as I recall the taser is supposed to be holstered on one side and the service weapon on the other side, to avoid confusion, to avoid just this sort of situation from happening in the first place. The weapons also don’t look the same, as I recall.
Because the perp resisted?
So you agree that Alec Baldwin should go to prison?
Natacha — someone who was not posing a direct threat? This was a felon with a long rap sheet who was attempting to flee the police. He had already caught one policeman in the car door as he tried to drive away. How do you think it would have gone if police had to chase him, which they’d be duty-bound to do? This guy was a definite threat to society. The irony is that, his family, who never bothered with him during his long life of crime, will now cash in on their delinquent son. What a scam.
Turley says:
“Many predicted that the largely white jury would deliver racial injustice. As with the jury in the murder trial of Ahmaud Arbery, these jurors showed again that they exhibit the objectivity and integrity too often missing in our commentators and politicians.”
Turley puts his faith in the objectivity and integrity of the jurors. Bravo! Let’s see him make that assurance *if and when* Trump and/or the Trump Organization is found guilty of fraud by a jury. I’m *guessing* the Trumpists are going to dismiss Turley’s faith in the jury system and call the trials a “sham.”
You heard it here first.
It’s been nearly a year and Trump is still embedded deep in your soul. Think about that…if you can.
Achiral1 warns:
“It’s been nearly a year and Trump is still embedded deep in your soul. Think about that…if you can.”
I think about Trumpism all the time. Until he is held accountable for his chronic and habitual lying, I won’t stop thinking about him.
Then you are going to have a long and miserable life.
Possibly. But are you sure that I will not one day see this reprobate and sexual degenerate in jail?
And…..the resident TDS patient has checked in.
Just Stoppitt says:
“And…..the resident TDS patient has checked in.”
Turley suffers from TDS too. He who called for Trump’s Congressional CENSURE after 1/6:
“THE CASE FOR A TRUMP CENSURE”
https://jonathanturley.org/2021/01/13/the-case-for-a-trump-censure/
“Trump repeated clearly false statements about the constitutional process and made the unconscionable demand that Pence should usurp that process by “sending back” electoral votes. As many of us said repeatedly for weeks, Pence had no such authority and could not unilaterally act as Trump demanded. Yet, Trump continued to tell his followers that such authority existed — leading many of them to launch a hashtag campaign to “#hangmikepence.”
I’m in good company with Turley; we both know Trump is a liar:
Everyone knows Trump is a liar. You just have the added mental illness factor.
BaDa Boom!
Trump should have been a cop.
He would never put his life on the line. Remember, he shirked his patriotic duty by finagling out of Vietnam. He should have been a used car salesman or a carnival barker.
His IS a carnival barker: that’s what “The Apprentice” was: all show, all bullsh*t, all fantasy, especially the fantasy about being a self-made billionaire. Then, there’s Trump University ($25M payoff for defrauding “students/suckers”), Trump steaks, Trump golf accessories, Trump ties…..the list goes on, but it’s all based on the lie that he’s fabulously wealthy due just to his talent and skills as a deal-maker. Of course, to be a true believer, you have to overlook the 6 bankruptcies, the thousands of lawsuits for breach of contract and fraud and all of the failed businesses, including the Trump Casinos, plus the fact that his father propped him up financially well into his forties, until control of his finances was taken away and given to a conservator due to dementia.
“Of course, to be a true believer, you have to overlook . . .”
To be a true hater, you have to overlook a man’s achievements, while highlighting his failures.
If I’m a Twin Cities cop, I will now just either a) let the bad guy go or b) forego the taser entirely in favor of my pistol. Criminalizing tragic mistakes does not lead to a safer public.
With juries like these you’d be better off just shooting yourself.
Diplomacy did not stop Hitler, and it will not stop Putin, either. Only bombs and bullets will. The actions of soldiers speak much louder than the words of diplomats.
Thank you Jesse Ventura for appointing amazing Judge Regina Chu to the bench, who today DENIED BAIL and instant release on $100,000 bond and sent officer Kim Potter DIRECTLY TO JAIL, NO BOND.
Two of the prosecutors in the Derek Chauvin trial were prosecutors in this trial.
Remember how Potter’s defense counsel Earle Gray BELLOWED OUT LOUD IN COURT how Daunte Wright caused his own death?
Today that same defense attorney Gray begged Judge Chu to release Potter on bond, but was denied by Judge Chu.
Judge Regina Chu told defense counsel Earle Gray that she cannot treat this case any different from any other conviction of this kind and therefore counsel’s request for bond IS DENIED.
Judge Chu is bu,bu,bu,bu, badd….ass.
Sentencing (late Feb. or March) on count one up to maximum 15 years in prison, up to 10 years on count two.
The state has indicated they are seeking an aggravated factor in sentencing due to her abusing her position of authority.
Prosecutors claim Officer Potter created an unreasonableness of danger by firing her weapon which could have caused Daunte Wright’s vehicle to careen out of control.
How do you abuse power if you are conscious of the abuse? Also, the bodycam video clearly shows the car is in park at the time of the shooting. Wright put the car in gear and drove off after being shot.
* aren’t conscious
Duante Wright pulled over for a hanging air freshener, killed by a cop trying to effect arrest over a misdemeanor warrant.
We should de-criminalize all non-violent misdemeanors, since 90% of the 15 million arrests each year are for misdemeanor arrests.
If we eliminate the arrest process for non-violent misdemeanors, we will categorically eliminate the great majority of police abuse and murder.
Instead of non-violent misd. arrest, a community can isssue a citation with a court date; if defendant fails to appear at their court date, then revoke defendant’s driver’s license until they appear in court and resolve their issue.
Ron: “Duante Wright pulled over for a hanging air freshener, killed by a cop trying to effect arrest over a misdemeanor warrant.
+++
“Wright was facing criminal charges for trying to choke a woman to death while robbing her at gunpoint.”
“lawsuit accusing Wright and an accomplice of shooting a guy during a carjacking.”
“In addition to allegedly committing a slew of gun crimes before the age of 20 (based on only one year and six months of public records), Wright was stopped for driving with expired license plate tags. He didn’t have car insurance. He also didn’t have a driver’s license. (And yes, white people are busted for these infractions all the time.”
“When the officers ran his name, they discovered that Wright was driving on a suspended license, there was a restraining order against him, and a bench warrant for his arrest on a weapons charge. They had no choice: They had to arrest him.”
“But as one officer began to handcuff him, Wright resisted, jumped back in his car and was about to flee — along with an officer trapped in the passenger window, trying to get control of the gears.”
https://townhall.com/columnists/anncoulter/2021/12/22/the-daunte-wright-nyt-readers-dont-know-n2600991
The officer should never have been charged, must less convicted and Wright should have been safely tucked away behind bars for his previous offenses so he wouldn’t have been in this position.
His death is due to his own disgusting behavior and the almost equally disgusting conduct of a judicial system that let this animal run riot in the community.
Young, is that all you have?
It’s always impressive when someone weighs in from another planet. You sound like your world is swimming in criminals. No thanks.
Ron, the police were trying to arrest Wright for several outstanding felony warrants when he was accidentally shot.
With regard to the your solution to police violence, it is ill conceived.
1) decriminalize non-violent misdemeanors.
2) send citations (subpoenas?) to people who commit non-violent misdemeanors.
3) revoke the drivers license of people who do not respond to the citations.
4) realize that driving without a license is a misdemeanor and is therefore no longer a crime. (Oops!)
5) live in a city where serial misdemeanor criminals act with impunity (see San Francisco).
This is where jury nullification comes into play.
If I were on the jury I would have hung it, assuming I failed to convince hold outs that a criminal trial was wrong, and as a jury, it is our duty to correct the bad prosecution.
It would not have short circuited justice, as civil litigation is still on the table.
The proper power of the jury is to decide both the facts and the law.
On a side note, the protestors out front were very vocal in their blood lust. Declaring the ex police officer should rot in prison till she dies. Strange attitude from those of the political persuasion pushing prison reform.
If she was in fact guilty of a crime the law is wrong. When the decedent put up a fight and decided to run on a warrant he was in the wrong and it resulted his His death. He caused his death.
Sorry he’s dead but cops ought to walk off the job.
toads aren’t allowed on juries.
Putin presuming that Russia is the moral equivalent of the United States is like Hitler presuming that Germany was the moral equivalent of the United States. Good countries SHOULD make evil countries feel threatened.
I wish there was a limit to the number of times a judge could send a jury back w cu hen it did announce it was deadlocked. . Strongly assertive jurors could often(?) make one jurors been to the majority
On the other hand, this verdict may send out a message that even if you didn’t intend to kill someone, that you are held to licensed professional standards, and you are actually held to a higher standard of care than the average person. Although an accident, accidents seem to happen more often when there is less personal liability at stake.
Gary, with medical errors accounting for ~250,000 deaths per year, Doctors should be quaking in their masks.
This was a civil, not criminal case. yet another example of political driven legal results. I blame prosecutors.
The prosecutors in this case are truly vile people. The intentionally misrepresented the law to the jury, and were interested only in winning – justice be damned. And the judge was incompetent – allowed improper stuff over objection after objection. Officer Potter got the shaft. There will no be another round of police resignations, and even greater difficulty in hiring good people to be police officers. Make a mistake? Go to jail! No smart person will sign up under those circumstances. And the chances of seeing any aggressive police work just disappeared. Sit in your car, take your time going to calls, write reports. No confrontations with ANYBODY. Warrant? Sorry, I forgot to ask!
Yep, if a mistake resulting in death is now a crime, our society is screwed. Physicians, airplane pilots, bus drivers? Nope, I’ll go be a computer programmer (and the pay is probably much better).
In moments of terror, there is no “higher standard” – the brain stem takes over. What you’re suggesting is “no mistakes” – an impossible standards. Glad I’m gone from law enforcement – if I wasn’t, my badge would be on the chief’s desk in the working. And if you have an authority for your last statement (rather than just talking out your backside), I’d love to see it. In God we trust, all others bring data.
Maybe so but you don’t put good cops in jail for making a mistake. A surgeon killed my grandfather, we didn’t put him in jail. Same difference.
why should this case in particular send out such a message when it’s hardly the first time an officer has been similarly convicted after mistakenly discharging his/her gun instead of the taser?
I make it a point to approach cops in the hospital, church, university campus, grocery store, when ever I see them in my midst, and thank them for what they do. When I do, they are always appreciative and some are very moved to tears.
For the life of me i do not know why anyone would want to be a cop today. They are unsung heroes.
There was not less personal liability. If you are able to put yourself in Potter’s hands, you may be able to understand where she’s coming from–and why the law makes a distinction between negligence and recklessness. It’s an important distinction, and one that the judge in this case allowed the prosecutor to constantly confuse in the minds of the jury.
She was absolutely negligent, and Wright did not deserve to die, no matter what he did. But had she not been convicted criminally, she would have lost everything in her life as a result in a civil trial.
Surprise, surprise ! ( not ). Anything less than ‘ the book ‘ and the good people (?) of Minneapolis would burn the town down, eh ? . . . Well maybe not. After all it is pretty dang cold this time of year . . .
I thought second degree verdict was a likely result, but not first. Would be interested in seeing an anonymous polling of the jurors
Law wrong. Another disgraceful outcome.