Opening statements are set to begin in the trial of Kim Potter, the former Brooklyn Center police officer charged with first- and second-degree manslaughter for fatally shooting Daunte Wright earlier this year.
Potter’s trial began at the Hennepin County Government Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Wednesday (Dec. 8). As reported by REVOLT, a mostly-white jury was seated for the trial last week.
Potter, a 26-year veteran of the police department, has maintained that she mistakenly grabbed her gun rather than her taser after pulling over Wright for an alleged traffic violation this April.
According to former Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon, the Black 20-year-old was initially pulled over for having an expired registration tag. However, officers discovered he had an outstanding warrant for a gross misdemeanor weapons charge and tried to arrest him, which police say he resisted.
Potter claims Wright escaped officers’ grip when she shot him in the chest, using her firearm instead of her taser. The new father was pronounced dead at the scene.
Potter previously said she will testify in court in her own defense.
The former cop faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison and a $30,000 fine if convicted of first-degree manslaughter. The second-degree manslaughter charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $20,000 fine.
Potter was initially only charged with second-degree manslaughter. However, in September, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed an amended complaint to add the first-degree manslaughter charge. The revised charge claims Potter caused Wright’s death “while committing the misdemeanor offense of reckless handling or use of a firearm so as to endanger the safety of another with such force and violence that death or great bodily harm to any person was reasonably foreseeable.”