The city’s municipal council concluded that the police were “not reformable” and that it would “end the current policing system”.
The police of Minneapolis “dismantled” : it is the shock measure announced, Sunday June 7 in the evening, by the authorities of the city of Minnesota, where George Floyd died at the hands of the police, on May 25. Thousands of people demonstrated again this weekend in the United States, as well as around the world, against racism , without these rallies degenerating into riots and looting as had been the case in the days following followed the drama in several American cities.
Events all over the world
Belgian police nevertheless arrested 150 people involved in acts of vandalism on Sunday evening in Brussels, at the end of a rally in which almost 10,000 people participated. From Bristol to Budapest via Madrid and Rome, tens of thousands of Europeans joined the protests sparked by the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, on Sunday when he was arrested by police. A video, filmed by a passer-by during his arrest, shows a white policeman , Derek Chauvin, keeping his knee for nearly nine minutes on the neck of the victim who is flattened on the ground and complains of not being able to breathe.
In Rome, an unforeseen demonstration gathered in the vast Piazza del Popolo thousands of young people who knelt in silence, raised their fists, for nine minutes. Demonstrators in Madrid also knelt down with their fists, a protest against police brutality against blacks initiated in 2016 by the American football player Colin Kaerpernick .
Derek Chauvin was initially charged with manslaughter, but this chief was reclassified on June 4 as murder, punishable by forty years in prison . He is scheduled to appear in court for the first time on Monday.
The three police officers who accompanied him, who had not been prosecuted immediately, were finally charged with complicity, and placed in detention. These lawsuits were at the heart of the protesters’ demands, but they did not end the mobilization which has even since gone global.
“Rebuild”
Last consequence to date: the police of Minneapolis, in Minnesota, will disappear in its current form. So decided on Sunday its city council. President Lisa Bender said on CNN:
“We are committed to dismantling the police force as we know it in the city of Minneapolis and to rebuilding with our population a new model of public security which really ensures the safety of our population. “
She said she intended to transfer funds allocated from the police budget to population-based projects. The city council also intends to examine how to replace the current police, she added, adding:
“The idea of not having a police force is certainly not a short-term project. “
According to city councilor Alondra Cano, the council concluded that the city police were “not reformable and that we were going to end the current system of policing” .
But the city mayor Jacob Frey had made known before the council’s vote that he was not in favor of this dismantling, saying that he preferred a “major structural reform for the overhaul of this structurally racist system” . As a result, the city council’s promise may take time to materialize.
The Democrats called on Sunday for a major transformation of the police, accused of discrimination, injustice and brutality against black Americans.
Prohibition of “bottlenecks”
Several elected Democrats want to attack what they believe to be the result of a racism which has plagued the history of the United States since slavery, by presenting a law to reform the police on the whole Monday the United States.
Certain measures have already been imposed at a local level since the beginning of this protest movement. The chief of police of Seattle thus prohibited the use of tear gas for thirty days. Minneapolis police have announced that they are now banning the dangerous “choke” technique. Floyd’s death is just the latest in a long string in recent years of deaths of mostly unarmed black men in interactions with white police.
American star Beyoncé also echoed Black Lives Matter’s messages with other artists on Sunday during a virtual ceremony on YouTube, called “Dear Class of 2020” and aimed at graduates. of the whole world. The singer said:
“You came here in the midst of a global crisis, a racial pandemic and the worldwide expression of outrage at the senseless murder of another unarmed black human being. And you still succeeded. We are so proud of you. “
