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Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges said on Monday she had requested a federal civil rights investigation into a police shooting over the weekend that seriously wounded a 24-year-old black man and set off protests.
Activists, who said Jamar Clark was unarmed and handcuffed when he was shot in the head on Sunday, blocked the entrance of a police precinct overnight and demanded that authorities release video of the incident. Police said he was not handcuffed.
“I have asked for this because we need all the tools we have available to us… a healthy investigative process is best for everyone, the family, the officers and the community,” Hodges said, adding that she had heeded voices of members of the community including police.
“So far, no bystander videos of the actual shooting have surfaced,” according to a report by Minneapolis weekly City Pages. “Footage of the incident was likely captured at the Elks Lodge – an African American fraternal order – across the street. Police confiscated the tapes, and have not yet released them to the public.”
City Pages quoted two alleged witness stating that Clark was detained and lying on the ground just before the shooting. “The young man was just laying there,” said Teto Wilson, whose statement was released by the Minneapolis NAACP. “He was not resisting arrest. Two officers were surrounding the victim on the ground, an officer maneuvered his body around to shield Jamar’s body, and I heard the shot go off.”
The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension was continuing its own investigation and will hand over the results to prosecutors.
Clark was shot in the head and was “brain dead” according to family members cited in local media. Reuters was not able to independently confirm Clark’s condition and officials said only that it was “unchanged.”
Minneapolis Police Chief Janee Harteau, who spoke at a news conference with Mayor Hodges, said that the names of two police officers involved would not be released yet.
Deaths of unarmed black men and women at the hands of police over the past year have fueled criticism over the treatment of minorities by police in the United States and rekindled a national civil rights movement under the banner Black Lives Matter.
Harteau said two police vehicles were damaged in protests on Sunday night, and added one person had been arrested and charged in relation to the property damage.
Police said that at about 12:45 a.m. on Sunday, they responded to a report of an assault and shot a man during a struggle after he confronted paramedics and disrupted their ability to give aid.
The suspect was not in handcuffs during the physical altercation and was taken by ambulance to Hennepin County Medical Center, police said.
Witnesses said Clark was handcuffed when he was shot in the head and his body was removed quickly from the scene, according to a Black Lives Matter Minneapolis statement.
The Minneapolis National Association for the Advancement of Colored People said Clark “was murdered, execution style” by police.
Up to 20 witnesses said he was dead at the scene and his body was “lifeless,” Minneapolis NAACP spokeswoman Raeisha Williams said.
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Jamar Clark Was Detained Before Police Shot Him In The Head, Witnesses Say
