a 150 year performance review of the minneapolis police department mpd150 TOTHOSE WHO'VE LEDTHE WAY The initiative that we have named MPD150 stands on the shoulders of the activists and organizers, community organizations and street protesters, whistleblowers, families of loved ones lost to police violence and the numerous others who have led the fight for truly safe communities in the past and still today. Their contributions over the years have made this undertaking possible. For this we honor them. MPD150 is an independent association of organizers, activists, researchers, and artists that came together in the spring of 2016 in anticipation of the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD)'s 150th anniversary. We are not the project of any organization, although we recognize the contributions many of them have made over the years. Some of them have shared leads and material for this report. Enough is Enough is one component of a multi­ faceted effort that includes public art, educational activities, political action, cultural activism, and more. We hope to inspire and support new community initiatives that contribute to a shared vision of a police-free future. TABLEOF CONTENTS 1: Intro ......................................... 3 2: Where We've Been .................... 4 3: Where We're At ........................ 14 4: Where We're Going .................. 25 5: Findings ................................... 33 6: Credits ..................................... 35 M PD 150 Enough is Enough! Enough is Enough! That is both the The US police system, we contend, is not outlines of the police-free communities conclusion and the title of this report, reformable. Efforts to reform it - aimed of the future. We have no shortage of a 150-year performance review of at addressing recruitment, training, ancient cultural traditions, innovative the Minneapolis Police Department discipline, oversight and transparency social programs, and community (MPD). The report is the product of - are quickly and effectively neutralized resilience strategies from which to draw. an investigation into the conduct of by the organized opposition of police the department over the fifteen decades departments and their unions and The transition to a resilience-based since its founding in 1867; a survey of professional associations. In fact, these Minneapolis will not come overnight. its current role and impact especially cycles of reform - looking remarkably It will require a succession of steps that on marginalized communities; and an the same from one decade to the next - starts with limiting the harm caused exploration of viable alternatives to serve to temporarily pacify resistance daily by police power, and beginning the policing model. The purpose of this from victimized communities without the orderly transfer of resources from report is to take the idea of police-free altering police business as usual. They the police to projects, programs, communities out of the realm of fantasy also reassure white communities, who and grassroots initiatives that meet and place it firmly in the public agenda are spared the mistreatment directed people's emergency and long-term as a practical necessity. at their darker-skinned neighbors and needs. Neighborhoods with good jobs, often turn to the police for security. In affordable homes, healthy food, and Our analysis locates the roots of police the short term, reigning in police abuse green places to play produce less conflict brutality, corruption and racism in its by demanding reforms can provide only and fewer mental health crises than ones history and founding mission. This is limited relief. that feature empty lots, under-funded where our attention should be directed, schools, and starvation wages. Like not at frivolous arguments such as Part two speaks of the present. It features any process of change, the transitional whether "all cops are bad." The presence interviews by MPD150's interview team period will raise new questions and pose of officers with good intentions, recruits and by partner organizations. We share new problems. It will, naturally, meet who join the force to make things better the reflections of professionals (in areas with concerted resistance. The solutions or even reform-minded chiefs does not such as mental health, domestic and that result, however, will be designed actually alter the oppressive behavior of sexual violence, emergency response, to help all our communities thrive, not police agencies. and homelessness) whose work is contain and divide them. impacted by the police. They report The report is organized according to the that the militarized, combative presence The material presented here turns the three areas of focus that have guided of police is not the medicine needed in common wisdom on its head. The idea its preparation: the past, the present, our traumatized communities. Even the of a police-free future is neither naive and the future . This outline is followed, social service functions absorbed into nor unrealistic. It is the only pragmatic both in the printed version and on the police system over the years would solution to the challenge of a police MPD150's website, with the addition of be better-served by removing them from system rooted in the era of slavery and case studies, community interviews, and department control. We also hear from Indian removal which has defeated every alternative resources. community members who contend with reform effort thrown at it. To believe police intervention in their daily lives. that we are just one or two reforms away The first section will establish that the The constant reality of intimidation, from turning the police into a trusted MPD, far from being an agent of "public harassment and bullying are the wide partner of the very communities it has safety" or even "law enforcement," has base of the police misconduct iceberg of treated like enemies to be conquered always acted as the enforcement arm of which murder by police is just the tip . for a century and a half... that is the the economic and political elite. Like its ultimate in magical thinking! fellow departments around the country, In the third section, we turn to face it is at the front end of a system of mass the future. What might it look like if It is time for Minneapolis to look this incarceration that devours black, brown we addressed our communities' needs problem in the face and begin a new, and indigenous peoples, stripping them as neighbors and creative problem more courageous, conversation about of voting rights, job prospects and solvers instead of relying on force and our future, a conversation that includes dignity, keeping wages low and people imprisonment? Here we draw on the possibilities that the police, media divided. insights from our interviews, the promise pundits, and corporate lobbyists tell of existing alternatives, and examples us are out of bounds. This report is a from other places to begin sketching the contribution to that discussion. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! 150 YEARS OF THE MINNEAPOLIS POLICE Where We've Been: A People's History of the Minneapolis Police Department INTRODUCTION particularly illustrative stories from rebellious commumt1es in occupied MPD's history. These pieces served as the Ireland. From their very beginnings The Minneapolis Police Department basis for the incomplete history we're in London, police departments were (MPD) was established in 1867, going to tell here. If you're interested rooted in colonialism and the protection 150 years ago. On the department's in learning more about a particular of property - policing's origins in the website, they describe their mission incident in this section, and it has a ill United States, though, are even darker. as "to protect with courage, to serve next to it, that means there's a longer with compassion." Unfortunately, they piece about it, including citations, on Though the 13 colonies imported a have failed in that mission many times the timeline section of our website: system of elected sheriffs and constables, over the last century and a half: even a www.mpd150.com. who were empowered to enforce some cursory look at MPD's history reveals laws, formalized American policing patterns of brutality, systemic racism, One more note: the past cannot be really began with slave patrols. Made and failed reform. changed. The weight of the tragedy that up of local militias and slaveowners the Minneapolis Police Department who patrolled the countryside stopping In this section of the report, we will has caused can't be dismissed. But Black people and forcing escaped examine that history from its beginning, that doesn't mean there's not hope: slaves back into bondage, slave patrols starting with the origins of the concept in our present and future sections, enforced white supremacy from some of policing itself. We'll look at the first we'll be discussing the current state of of the earliest days of the European fifty years of the Minneapolis Police community safety in Minneapolis and occupation of the Americas. These Department, and the department's early how we can strengthen it by building patrols (and their Northern equivalents, history as a corrupt political tool. Then real alternatives to the police. It's town watches) were empowered to we'll move into the middle years, 1918 up to us to build a way to keep our enforce cur£ews against Black and - 1967, and MPD's increasing violence communities vibrant and healthy. But to Native folks, search and confiscate towards Black and Native communities, imagine where we're going requires an their property, and brutalize them, with immigrants, union members, and other understanding of where we've been. So or without cause.2 These groups were marginalized groups. Finally, we'll look let's get started. gradually granted additional powers at the most recent fifty years - a time of and jurisdiction, eventually evolving disgrace, militarization, and countless UNDEVELOPED: directly into modern police departments.