The Washington County attorney’s office has filed former Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter with second-degree manslaughter in Sunday’s shooting death of Daunte Wright during a traffic stop.
Potter, a 26-year veteran of the Brooklyn Center police department, resigned on Tuesday.
The second-degree manslaughter charge carries a maximum prison sentence of ten years and a fine of $20,000.
Potter’s body camera video was released less than 24 hours after Wright’s death.
It showed Potter, 48, waving her service revolved while shouting “taser, taser” when it appears Wright was trying to get away from officers during the stop.
It can be heard in the video officers telling Wright he was being arrested on a gross misdemeanor warrant.
The charge was discovered by officers after they pulled Wright over for expired plates, according to police officials.
Potter was heard expressing shock after realizing she had shot Wright, who managed to drive away and crashed his car into another vehicle before he died.
The case was referred to Washington County attorney Pete Orput under a practice that moves prosecution away from local jurisdiction to avoid appearance of a conflict of interest.
Brooklyn Center’s mayor fired the city manager and the police chief resigned in the wake of yet another shooting of a Black man by an officer in the Twin Cities.
The shooting has touched off three days of protest, some of them turning violent at the Brooklyn Center police station.
There has also been some looting in Brooklyn Center and Minneapolis.
The region is already stressed from the ongoing trial of former MPD officer Derek Chauvin, charged in last year’s death of George Floyd.