Pittsburgh community leaders react to deadly shooting involving Minnesota police officer

PITTSBURGH — Tensions between police and protesters flared for the second consecutive night in a Minnesota suburb Monday after a police officer, whom her superiors said mistook her handgun for a stun gun, shot and killed a 20-year-old Black man during a traffic stop.

The shooting claimed the life of Daunte Wright, who had been stopped for driving with expired tags, Gannon said. Brooklyn Center is located on the northwest border of Minneapolis.

It’s less than 10 miles from where former officer Derek Chauvin is accused of killing George Floyd in 2020.

The shooting is being called an accident, but Wright’s death has been ruled a homicide by the medical examiner. Leaders in the Pittsburgh area said this could happen again, and it could happen here.

“We’re going to see more of this until the laws change, until something is done from the federal level,” said Kenneth Huston, president of the Pa. NAACP. “When you look at the shooting and you look at the way the shooting was done, how was that justified? Was the police officers lives in danger? No.”

During the traffic stop, officers learned Wright had an outstanding warrant. He went back into his car, and that’s when police said one of the officers mistakenly shot him instead of using her Taser.

The Pittsburgh Citizen Police Review Board said making a mistake like that is not common at all. Officers across the country have similar training when it comes to Tasers.

“Police officers are trained to have their Taser on their weak side so that they aren’t going to make that mistake. We don’t know why she did,” said Beth Pittinger, of the CPRB.

Pittinger said that officer also had years of experience to be mistaking a Taser and a gun. She told Channel 11 traffic stops like that one do not need confrontation, and she has heard similar complaints in our region.

“We with our community partners have said, send them a ticket. Don’t invite a disaster,” said Pittinger. “You can identify the owner of the vehicle through registration and pursue it that way rather than putting the risk out there.”

Meanwhile, Huston said many police officers are not trained in cultural sensitivity, and that is just part of the problem.

Other activists across western Pennsylvania have taken to social media to express their concerns over this most recent shooting.

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