perspective of young black males. there s no question that something in kim potter s the back of her brain said, this is more dangerous than it actually was. sara, what was the one key piece of evidence or the one key moment of the trial then that you think pushed this toward conviction? i think i don t know exactly what changed the trajectory of obviously a struggling jury. i do believe that the ability to compare the weapons and just see how grossly negligent she was or criminally negligent she was given the vast differences between these two weapons. so although i see mark s point, this was just a very egregious case. it s not every day an officer with 26 years of training and certification mistakes a gun for a taser. i think that the jury s ability i mentioned that the
should be held criminally responsible. obviously, i respect the jury s verdict. i still don t think that grabbing a gun, believing it to be a taser, saying that it s a taser, not having any prior bad acts that you could go back and say, this is a bad seed, it s all of that that i m concerned about that we are holding cops to that responsibility. do you agree with sara this would not have happened three or five years ago, this verdict? i do. we are finally in the days of floyd and now this case and some others that we have been involved in and have talked about. we are without question holding cops more responsible for their actions. they don t get a free pass. i do think we need to talk about where had came from. i think this is an implicit bias reaction that we now need to truly train cops and law enforcement how to rethink their perspective of young black males. there s no question that something in kim potter s the
what would you like to see happen in that case, benjamin crump, in terms of the sentencing? well, erica, in the same courthouse in minneapolis about there was a black police officer, officer muhammad lure who shot and killed an unarmed white woman and his arguments were parallel to kim potter s. he said i m sorry, i didn t mean it, he cried, he said i was trying to protect my fellow officer from being killed in the dark of night, and yet his argument was not accepted. he was convicted and sentenced to 12 years. over and above the ten-year recommendation. so what we believe is this is a chance to see if the family of daunte wright, when the roles are reversed, and it is a white policeman that killed an unarmed young black man, will we get an
anytime a defendant expresses remorse in a trial where they re accused of an unintentional killing, it matters to the jury. the jury will be persuaded by those tears. at the same time, my heart tells me, i have never been more deeply offended listening to the testimony of a defendant than i was listening to kim potter s. she admitted that they racially profiled daunte wright. she didn t use those words, but she came as close to saying that as she s ever going to come. she admitted that she had the ability to put a stop to what was happening and she didn t. she admitted that she wrongfully killed him, and after she shot him, she collapsed to the ground crying over what the consequences might be for her. and she monopolized all the first responders standing nearby her, who could have tried to render aid, because as far as she knew, he needed help and so did his passenger, and he could have been saved. despite all of that, my mind steps back in and reminds me that the law was engineered t