Daunte Wright

On April 11, 2021, Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old black American man, was fatally shot in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, by police officer Kimberly Potter during a traffic stop and attempted arrest for an outstanding warrant.

After a brief struggle with officers, Potter shot Wright in the chest once at close range.

Wright then drove off a short distance until his vehicle collided with another and hit a concrete barrier.

An officer administered CPR to Wright; paramedics were unable to revive him, and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

Potter said she meant to use her service Taser, shouting "Taser! Taser! Taser!"

just before firing her service pistol instead.

The shooting sparked protests in Brooklyn Center and renewed ongoing demonstrations against police shootings in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area, leading to citywide and regional curfews.

Demonstrations took place over several days, and spread to cities across the United States.

Two days after the incident, Potter and Brooklyn Center police chief Tim Gannon resigned from their positions.

Potter was convicted of first-degree manslaughter and second-degree manslaughter at a jury trial in Hennepin County.

She received a two-year sentence, of which she served 16 months incarcerated.

Wright's family settled a wrongful death lawsuit with the City of Brooklyn Center for US$3.25million.

The passenger in Wright's car, who was injured in the collision, settled a civil suit with the city for US$350000.

At 1:53p.m. local time, the trainee officer initiated a traffic stop of Wright's vehicle on 63rd Avenue North near Orchard Avenue and called for backup.

After pulling the vehicle over, the trainee officer approached Wright's vehicle.

Wright provided his name but did not have a driver's license or proof-of-insurance card.

The trainee officer returned to his squad car.

Meanwhile, Wright phoned his mother.

Potter's supervisor arrived on the scene, and the officers ran Wright's name through a police database.

They learned he had an open arrest warrant for failing to appear in court on a gross misdemeanor weapons violation for carrying a gun without a permit, and that there was a protective order against him by an unnamed woman.

The officers decided to arrest Wright and ensure the passenger was not the same woman who had the protective order against him.

Police body camera footage showed Potter, her supervisor, and the trainee officer approaching the car.

She had worked for the department since 1995, shortly after finishing at Saint Mary's University of Minnesota a year prior in 1994.

Potter, a field training officer, was training a new officer at the time of the incident.

She had completed annual re-certifications for her weapons with her most recent Taser certification having been completed on March 2, 2021.

Alayna Albrecht-Payton, a 20-year-old resident of Saint Paul, Minnesota, and Wright's girlfriend, was sitting in the passenger's seat of the vehicle and was injured in the crash.

Two other Brooklyn Center police officers were involved in the traffic stop.

One of them was a trainee working with Potter who also participated in the attempted arrest.

On April 11, 2021, Wright was driving with Albrecht-Payton in a white 2011 Buick LaCrosse that was registered to his brother.

They were on their way to a car wash.

Kimberly Potter was a passenger in a patrol car with a trainee officer who observed Wright's vehicle signaling a right turn while it was in a left-turning lane.

The trainee officer also noticed that the vehicle had an expired registration tag on its license plate and had an air freshener hanging from the car's rearview mirror, a violation of Minnesota law.

Public outrage over Wright's death, one of several high-profile police killings of black Americans in the early 2020s, helped advance discussion of police reform measures.

In Brooklyn Center, the police department changed its policy on arresting people for misdemeanor offenses and city council introduced alternative public safety measures, but several proposed reforms failed to be implemented.

In Minnesota and elsewhere in the United States, Wright's death led to changes in Taser procedures and other policing policies.

Daunte Demetrius Wright was a 20-year-old living in Minneapolis, having recently moved there from Chicago.

He was the son of a black father and a white mother.

Wright played basketball in high school, but according to his father, he dropped out due to a learning disability about two years before the shooting.

He worked in retail and fast-food jobs to support his almost-two-year-old son, and had enrolled in a vocational school.

At the time of the shooting, Kimberly Ann Potter, a white woman from Champlin, Minnesota, was a 48-year-old police officer in the Brooklyn Center Police Department, and a mother of two sons.