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February 7, 2003
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photo: Clara NiiSka
Minneapolis
city councilman Dean Zimmerman addressed the crowd who came to
express their concerns about police brutality and law enforcement bias
at the “Public Hearing of Minneapolis Police Misconduct toward American
Indians,” held at the Minneapolis American Indian Center on Tuesday,
February 4th.
Zimmerman holds what he says is documentation of misconduct by the
Minneapolis Police. “The sheer mass of what is happening cannot
be denied,” he said. “If only 10%” of the complaints that have
been made to him are true, it is clear and convincing evidence of
serious problems. “I enter these stories into the record, so that
they will be available.”
Some of the Indian community members who spoke at the hearing gave
wrenching stories of experiences with Minneapolis police. Despite
repeated admonitions by Hearing organizers to limit themselves to
describing those experiences, many of them also addressed the problems
more broadly. The problem is “not only complaints about the
Police Department,” said Mille Lacs Anishinabe elder and writer Vince
Hill, “but also institutional racism in the City of Minneapolis and in
this state. We need to get to the heart of the issue.”
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