Kim Potter.Photo: Minnesota Department of Corrections
Kim Potter, the Minnesota police officer who fatally shotDaunte Wrightduring a traffic stop in 2021, was released from prison on Monday.
The Minnesota Department of Corrections said Potter will be on supervised release until December, when her sentence expires.
She was serving a two-year sentence for first- and second-degree manslaughter.
The release was in accordance with Minnesota law that mandates prisoners serve two thirds of their sentence in prison and the last third on supervised release.
She was released at 4 a.m. “out of an abundance of caution for the safety of Ms. Potter, DOC staff and the security of the correctional facility,” according to a department of corrections press release.
Wright’s mother Katie Wright said she has not forgiven Potter for taking her son’s life.
“Some say I should forgive to be at peace but how can I? I am so angry,” she toldCNN. “She is going to be able to watch her kids have kids and be able to touch them. I am always scared I am going to forget my son’s voice. It gave us some sense of peace knowing she would not be able to hold her sons. She has two. I can’t hold my son.”
Daunte Wright.
Wright said her family is thankful that Potter cannot work in law enforcement again.
“She will never be able to hurt anybody as a police officer again,” Katie Wright said. “That is the only sense of peace we get as a family.”
Potter shot Wright, a 20-year-old father, in the Minneapolis suburb of Brooklyn Center when he allegedly resisted arrest after being pulled over on April 11, 2021. Potter’s former police chief said that the officerbelieved she was shooting her Taser, not her service weapon, when she fired a single shot that killed Wright.
Potter entered a plea of not guilty to both charges of manslaughter.
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As the unarmed Wright did so, “The officer had the intention to deploy their Taser but instead shot Mr. Wright with a single bullet,” Gannon said at anews conferenceafter the shooting.
Wright was struck in the chest. His vehicle then traveled several blocks before crashing into another car, and he died at the scene.
Potter, a 26-year veteran of the Brooklyn Center police force,resigned in the wake of Wright’s death. Police Chief Gannon resigned as well.
In filing theoriginal criminal charge of second-degree manslaughter, Imran Ali, assistant criminal division chief in the Washington County Attorney’s Office, said that Potter “abrogated her responsibility to protect the public when she used her firearm rather than her Taser.”
He added: “Her action caused the unlawful killing of Mr. Wright and she must be held accountable.”
During the trial, Potter’s defense called the shooting a “horrific mistake,” but also asserted that Potter would have been within her rights to use deadly force on Wright because he could have dragged another officer with his car.
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source: people.com
