The officer who shot Amir Locke in February during a no-knock raid will not be facing criminal charges. 22-year-old Amir was just days away from moving from his crime-riddled Minneapolis neighborhood when police gunned him down at home.
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No Charges Faced
Minneapolis police officer Mark Hannem will not be facing criminal charges, prosecutors announced on Wednesday. Hannem shot and killed 22-year-old Amir Locke during an early-morning raid in February at an apartment complex.
Prosecutors stated that there was “insufficient evidence” to charge officer Mark Hanneman, who fired the fatal shot. Prosecutors also stated that there was not enough evidence to prove criminal wrongdoing by any of the other officers involved.
Amir Locke was sleeping on a sofa in his cousin’s apartment when a nine-member Swat team entered the home. In the body cam footage released by the police after the incident, Locke was seen under a blanket on the couch holding a gun – for which he had a permit – and was then shot three times by Hanneman. During the investigation of the raid, Mark Hanneman, said to investigators that when he saw Mr. Locke’s gun, he feared for his life, and that he had acted quickly. Hanneman was placed on administrative duty after the shooting but has since returned to his regular job, according to the Police Department.
A judge approved a warrant for the raid, which had been conducted as part of an investigation into a fatal shooting in the neighboring city of St Paul, one that Locke was neither a suspect nor named in the warrant.
On Wednesday, County Attorney Michael Freeman and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a statement that there was “insufficient admissible evidence to file criminal charges in this case,” and that the circumstances in the case “are such that an objectively reasonable officer in Officer Hanneman’s position would have perceived an immediate threat of death or great bodily harm.” He added that “an objectively reasonable officer would not delay in using deadly force”.
Amir’s father, Andre Locke, said Amir was only days away from moving to Texas to live with his mother. “He should be alive today, and his death is a tragedy.” Locke’s mother, Karen Wells said in a news conference following the announcement that she was “disgusted with Minneapolis, Minnesota.”
Locke was not a suspect on the warrant, which was being carried out in connection with a homicide investigation in nearby St. Paul. But after the killing, the Police Department’s first statement about it falsely described Mr. Locke as a suspect. “Amir Locke was a victim,” Attorney General Ellison said at a news conference on Wednesday. “He never should have been called a suspect.”
Minneapolis police officer Mark Hannem will not be facing criminal charges, prosecutors announced on Wednesday. Hannem shot and killed 22-year-old Amir Locke during an early-morning raid in February at an apartment complex.
Prosecutors stated that there was “insufficient evidence” to charge officer Mark Hanneman, who fired the fatal shot. Prosecutors also stated that there was not enough evidence to prove criminal wrongdoing by any of the other officers involved.
Amir Locke was sleeping on a sofa in his cousin’s apartment when a nine-member Swat team entered the home. In the body cam footage released by the police after the incident, Locke was seen under a blanket on the couch holding a gun – for which he had a permit – and was then shot three times by Hanneman. During the investigation of the raid, Mark Hanneman, said to investigators that when he saw Mr. Locke’s gun, he feared for his life, and that he had acted quickly. Hanneman was placed on administrative duty after the shooting but has since returned to his regular job, according to the Police Department.
A judge approved a warrant for the raid, which had been conducted as part of an investigation into a fatal shooting in the neighboring city of St Paul, one that Locke was neither a suspect nor named in the warrant.
On Wednesday, County Attorney Michael Freeman and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a statement that there was “insufficient admissible evidence to file criminal charges in this case,” and that the circumstances in the case “are such that an objectively reasonable officer in Officer Hanneman’s position would have perceived an immediate threat of death or great bodily harm.” He added that “an objectively reasonable officer would not delay in using deadly force”.
Amir’s father, Andre Locke, said Amir was only days away from moving to Texas to live with his mother. “He should be alive today, and his death is a tragedy.” Locke’s mother, Karen Wells said in a news conference following the announcement that she was “disgusted with Minneapolis, Minnesota.”
Locke was not a suspect on the warrant, which was being carried out in connection with a homicide investigation in nearby St. Paul. But after the killing, the Police Department’s first statement about it falsely described Mr. Locke as a suspect. “Amir Locke was a victim,” Attorney General Ellison said at a news conference on Wednesday. “He never should have been called a suspect.”
Mr. Ellison also used the conference on Wednesday to push for more legislation to overhaul policing, and he expressed exasperation at the slow pace of change. The Locke family has hired civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump to pursue a lawsuit against the city and to push the city to make changes to its police department.
At a news conference in New York on Wednesday, Karen Wells, Mr. Locke’s mother, stood next to Mr. Crump and the Rev. Al Sharpton and addressed the officer who killed her son: “The spirit of my baby is going to haunt you for the rest of your life.”
She made commentary directed at Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey regarding his management of the department and the city’s spike in violent crime, which, she said, led Mr. Locke to obtain a gun for protection. “My son was protecting himself, thinking he had to protect himself from all the crime that is out of control, Mayor Frey, the mayor of Minneapolis, that you can’t control,” she said. “So my son decided that if he’s going to go back and forth and do Instacart and DoorDash, he needed to bear arms, the legal way.”
Mayor Frey had already limited the use of no-knock warrants. However the murder of Amir Locke brought back accusations that the mayor had misled the public during his campaign for re-election last year when he claimed to have banned such warrants. In response, the mayor issued a new policy this week, which prohibits no-knock warrants and requires officers to knock and announce their presence, and then wait, before entering a building.
“This policy is among the most forward-looking and extensive in the nation, and will help keep both our residents and officers safe,” Mr. Frey said in a statement.