MINNEAPOLIS — The Minnesota Human Rights report released Wednesday blasting the Minneapolis Police Department for widespread misconduct also confirmed many of the findings KARE 11 Investigates has identified in its reporting on the MPD over the last two years.
Among those stories and findings:
* In February, KARE 11 reported that more than 150 field training officers (FTOs) had histories of misconduct – or about a third of all the trainers.
The Minnesota Human Rights investigation found that “MPD uses officers as field trainers even after the Police Chief has sustained findings of excessive force against them.”
The report also found that the FTO program “furthers a pattern of race-based policing.”
* In June 2020, KARE 11 reported that only about 2% of complaints against MPD officers resulted in disciplinary action.
Additionally, KARE 11 reported how the MPD “coaches” those accused of misconduct – meaning a sustained complaint remains hidden from the public.
The human rights report found the “MPD does not appropriately and consistently hold officers accountable for police misconduct.”
Additionally, human rights investigators had access to coaching records, and found that in 37% of the cases that coaching never happened, saying at times “MPD supervisors simply refused to coach officers.”
* KARE 11 has also done extensive reporting on how the MPD disproportionally used force against Blacks as well as stopped and searched Black drivers at rates far higher rates than whites.
The human rights report confirmed both of those findings, including saying their review, “demonstrates that race is the likely reason that MPD officers search, cite, use force against, and arrest Black individuals disproportionately during traffic stops.”
* A KARE 11 investigation showed an MPD officer escalating a situation against a Black protestor, who was arrested but not charged.
Human rights investigators found “officers are trained to be aggressive” which leads to “officers escalating situations.”
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