The former officer who killed Daunte Wright has been charged with manslaughter and released on bail. Local officials fortified her home.

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The former officer who killed Daunte Wright has been charged with manslaughter and released on bail. Local officials fortified her home.
Former Brooklyn Center Police Officer Kim Potter poses for a mugshot at the Hennepin County Jail on April 14, 2021 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.Handout
  • Kim Potter has been charged with second-degree manslaughter over the death of Daunte Wright.
  • Potter shot Wright during a traffic stop Sunday. She resigned as a police officer and was arrested.
  • Potter was released on a $100,000 bail. Images show her home surrounded by new barriers and fencing.
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Kim Potter, the police officer who killed Daunte Wright and sparked a new wave of anti-racism protests in the Minneapolis area, has been charged with second-degree manslaughter.

Potter was arrested Wednesday and charged over the death of Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, whom she killed during a police traffic stop Sunday in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota.

Potter, a 26-year veteran of the city police department, resigned soon after.

After posting bond on a $100,000 bail, Potter was released to await trial, per jail records reviewed by Insider. She is due in court on Thursday afternoon, the records say.

Insider reported Wednesday that fencing and a concrete barrier had been put up around her home in a Minneapolis suburb as a security measure.

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There were protests for several nights after Wright's killing.

Under Minnesota law, second-degree manslaughter is defined as "culpable negligence" involving "an unreasonable risk" in which a person "consciously takes chances of causing death or great bodily harm to another."

If Potter is found guilty, the crime carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years and a $20,000 fine.

The police said Potter and another officer stopped Wright for a routine traffic violation Sunday and attempted to take him into custody when they discovered he had an outstanding warrant for his arrest.

Bodycam video showed Wright break free from officers and enter the driver's side of his vehicle. An officer identified as Potter then drew her gun and shouted "Taser!" several times before Wright's vehicle began pulling away and Potter exclaimed that she shot him.

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The police have said Potter meant to draw and fire her stun gun, not her pistol.

Potter resigned in the wake of the killing, as did Brooklyn Center's police chief, Tim Gannon.

Benjamin Crump, a civil-rights lawyer who is representing the Wright family, issued a statement after Potter was charged in which he dismissed the claim that the shooting was an accident.

"This was no accident. This was an intentional, deliberate, and unlawful use of force," Crump said.

"Driving while Black continues to result in a death sentence. A 26-year veteran of the force knows the difference between a Taser and a firearm."

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Wright's killing has led to renewed anti-racism protests in the Minneapolis area, with a curfew imposed in several suburban areas of Minneapolis after several nights of unrest, local media reported.

The killing of Wright took place not far from the site where George Floyd died under the knee of an officer last year.

Floyd's death led to protests against racist policing in the wake of the death sweeping the US last summer. Tensions were already high in the city amid the murder trial of Derek Chauvin, the officer who knelt on Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes.

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