Minneapolis police chief talks reform, but does he mean it?

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We found it hard to discern the exact message Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara was trying to communicate in his Feb. 25 commentary (“Do we expect too much from police officers?”). It appears that he wants us to know that with multiple consent decrees, and the resulting required training to ensure the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) ends its racist policing practices, it may come with less time to train for active shooters. It seems as if O’Hara is using our community’s justified fear of these terrifying situations in order to water down or slow the required reforms of the MPD. This fear-based messaging is really disheartening from the chief law enforcement officer of Minneapolis charged with leading the reform and building trust with the public, whom the department serves.

The MPD has systematically undermined the public trust throughout the years and continues to do so under O’Hara’s leadership. The chief has hired individuals to serve as officers who should have no place on the force, including Tyler Timberlake, who was caught on video using excessive force against a defenseless Black man while he was a police officer in Virginia. The chief was aware of this when he signed off on Timberlake’s hiring. More recently, a former Hennepin County sheriff’s deputy, Lucas Weatherspoon, was caught on camera smiling while Lucas Bellamy, a Black man, was in extreme pain and pleading for help. Recently, Bellamy’s family, who founded the renowned Penumbra Theatre, filed a federal lawsuit alleging that Bellamy died in that incident because he was not given proper medical care. Disturbingly, Weatherspoon no longer works for Hennepin County, as records show that he was hired by O’Hara. These actions do not show a chief who is serious about rebuilding public trust. Where is the accountability for these wayward hiring decisions?

Additionally, the chief has made other policy changes that reduce public trust. After numerous incidents where teenagers and innocent bystanders were killed during high-speed police chases, the chief decided to relax the police pursuit policy to presumably make it easier for MPD officers to initiate these dangerous and deadly chases. O’Hara also increased the number of hours of overtime an officer can work, allowing an officer to work 80 hours per week even though studies show that with every hour of overtime, the chances of police officers using excessive force increases. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey is quoted as saying: “It’s a fact: Use of force goes up for every hour of overtime.”

Finally, the community has been demanding reforms to the police union contract for several years, and during this round of police union contract negotiations it was found that O’Hara and his bargaining committee did not move forward with many of the changes to the lopsided Police Federation contract that the community is demanding.

O’Hara wants us to believe that the MPD is doing all it can to rebuild public trust. It is clear that the actions he has been taking are going in the opposite direction. O’Hara must begin to strategically prioritize this work in addition to the required training under the federal and the Minnesota Department of Human Rights consent decrees that are the nuts and bolts of policing. This is what residents expect in order for the culture within the MPD to be transformed. In fact, it is what we deserve.

Nekima Levy Armstrong is founder of the Racial Justice Network (RJN), for which Kim Milliard and Pete Gamades are Criminal Justice Reform Committee members.