Following the death of African-American George Floyd, the Minneapolis City Council came up with the decision to ban police officers in the city to use chokeholds or neck restraints “for any reason.”
On Friday, June 5, the city council approved the terms of a stipulation for a temporary restraining order (TRO), which outlines a series of immediate changes to be implemented at the city’s Police Department. This comes after the Minnesota Department of Human Rights conducted an investigation into the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) on June 2 and filed a civil rights charge against them.
The order, which still needs to be approved by a judge before being enacted, is requiring any member of the MPD, regardless of their tenure or rank, to “immediately report” to their commander or their commander’s superiors or “safely intervene” should they see a colleague who is using a chokehold or any unauthorized use of force.
It also gives power to the police chief or the chief’s designee at the rank of deputy chief or above to authorize the use of crowd control weapons during protests.
In addition, the city’s Office of Police Conduct Review is also given authority to audit body worn camera footage and “file or amend complaints” on behalf of the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said in a tweet that this development “will help bring those layers of accountability.”
“This unprecedented energy & momentum for police reform has left Minneapolis poised not just to address our shortcomings, but to become a model for shifting police culture & uprooting systemic racism,” he said.
“We still have a long road to go towards change not just in city policy, but state law and the police union contract,” he added.
Floyd died last May 25 after a police officer, identified as Derek Chauvin, pressed his knee down on Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes. After his death, thousands of people were seen gathering on various streets in America to rally against police brutality and racial injustice, bringing with them placards that read “Black Lives Matter.”
Chauvin and three other police officers on the scene, Tou Thao, Thomas Lane, and J. Alexander Kueng, were fired and slapped with charges.
Chauvin was charged with second-degree murder in addition to the third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter charges filed against him earlier, while the three other former police officers were slapped with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter charges.