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Police Abolition Isn’t Crazy. It’s Beautiful.
On May 25, 2020, George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police six blocks from my house. He was killed after Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds. George Floyd begged for his mother and repeatedly told officers that he couldn’t breathe. Officers Chauvin, Thomas Lane, J. Alexander Kueng and Tou Thao were all fired and all of them are now facing charges. Derek Chauvin has been charged with second-degree murder.
His crime? Supposedly using a counterfeit twenty dollar bill.
By the next day, protests had erupted in Minneapolis. As a result of the bystander video, we were all able to witness the horrific murder and it created outrage around the world. By June 13, over 2,000 cities around the globe saw protests. Over sixty countries participated in the demonstrations.
The Twin Cities have experienced several deaths of Black men at the hands of police in the past several years. In addition to that, since 2015, there have been 11,500 documented instances of the police using force against its citizens. How many of these cases were against Black men and women? 6,650 of them (The New York Times, 6/3/2020).
Minneapolis has been a powder keg ready to explode.
Since the death of George Floyd, there have been calls for defunding the police, with many…
