Minnesota shooting charging decision awaited, protests go on

Prosecutors expect to decide on April 14 whether to charge a white former police officer who fatally shot a Black man during a traffic stop in a Minneapolis suburb, sparking nights of protests and raising tensions amid the nearby murder trial of the ex-officer charged with killing George Floyd.

Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter and Police Chief Tim Gannon resigned on April 13, two days after Potter shot 20-year-old Daunte Wright. Gannon has said he believed Potter mistakenly grabbed her pistol when she was trying to pull out her Taser.

Brooklyn Center Mayor Mike Elliott said at a news conference that the city had been moving toward firing Potter, a 26-year veteran, when she resigned. Elliott said he hoped her resignation would "bring some calm to the community," but that he would keep working toward "full accountability under the law."

Washington County Attorney Pete Orput told WCCO-AM that he had received information on the case from state investigators and hoped to have a charging decision on Wednesday. Orput did not respond to a message from The Associated Press. While the shooting happened in Hennepin County, prosecutors referred the case to nearby Washington County, a practice county attorneys in the Minneapolis area adopted last year in handling police deadly force cases.

"We have to make sure that justice is served, justice is done. Daunte Wright deserves that. His family deserves that," Elliott said.

But police and protesters faced off once again after nightfall Tuesday, with hundreds of protesters gathering again at Brooklyn Center's heavily guarded police headquarters, now ringed by concrete barriers and a tall metal fence, and where police in riot gear and National Guard soldiers stood watch.

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