Free Republic

The Minneapolis City Council has unanimously approved paying six social media influencers to spread city-approved messaging and updates throughout the upcoming murder trial of former officer Derek Chauvin, who has been charged in George Floyd's death. On Friday, the council approved $1,181,500 for communication with the community during the trial, CBS Minnesota reports.

As the political extremes have taken center stage in American life, domestic violent extremism has become the greatest threat to national security. But what do you do when the enemy is part of America? And when does political extremism cross the line into domestic terrorism? "There is a fine line there," said Michael Paul, Special Agent in Charge of the Minneapolis FBI. "But it is a very hard line for us, in that we don’t police thought, we don’t police ideology." Paul came to the Minneapolis FBI in September with a long resume in fighting domestic terrorism and counterintelligence. He...

The Minneapolis City Council, which led the nationwide “defund police” movement in cutting funding for cops, voted to increase the police budget by $6.4 million after the department suffered an extraordinary loss in personnel.The Minneapolis Police Department began 2020 with 817 officers but ended the year with 638 officers available to work. Fully 155 officers are on extended leave complaining of PTSD. The city council added $6.4 million to hire more officers after residents complained of slow response times by officers.According to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, violent crime increased 21 percent in 2020.NRO:Even so, three council members have written a proposal...

On Monday’s “CNN Tonight,” host Don Lemon reacted to Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-SC) argument that Vice President Kamala Harris could be impeached under the same standard that President Donald Trump was by saying that Harris was tweeting support for a fund that “helped people post bail if they were arrested while protesting.” And “There was no bailing out, right? Kamala Harris tweeted about a fund to help people post bail, which is entirely legal.”

Minneapolis is planning to spend $6.4 million to hire dozens of police officers, at a time when some City Council members and activist groups have been advocating to replace the police department following George Floyd’s death. The City Council voted unanimously Friday to approve the additional funding that police requested. The department says it only has 638 officers available to work — roughly 200 fewer than usual. An unprecedented number of officers quit or went on extended medical leave after Floyd’s death and the unrest that followed, which included the burning of a police precinct. With new recruit classes, the...

A University of Minnesota student made some pretty egregious allegations in an Instagram post about an interaction he had with campus police during the early morning hours of February 1st. These allegations were detailed in an alleged synopsis of this interaction between the individual and officers, with this university student proclaiming that the officers were not only rude but exercising some form of racial bias in their endeavors when stopping to speak with him. And as it turns out, portions of the student’s allegations were either highly embellished, or outright lies – and it was courtesy of the officer’s dash...

Violent crime in Minneapolis soared by over 20% last year, calling into question a litany of criminal justice reform measures proposed by local left-wing lawmakers. In total, the Minneapolis Police Department logged 5,422 violent crime incidents over the course of the year, an increase of 21% from the previous year and a substantial uptick from the city's five-year average of 4,496 violent crimes. Property crimes grew by 10%. The news comes after the city announced a tripling of the budget of the Office of Violence Prevention, a pseudo-police replacement agency staffed with unarmed caseworkers to intervene in conflict. Virtually all...

ST PAUL, Minn. — On Friday afternoon, Governor Walz announced in a press release that he has authorized the Minnesota National Guard to provide "public safety assistance" in Minneapolis and St. Paul during the trials of the four former Minneapolis police officers charged in George Floyd's death. “There are some public safety events for which you cannot plan, and there are some for which you can," he said in the release. "The upcoming trials of the former officers involved in the death of George Floyd have raised the potential of civil unrest in Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and nearby communities. At...

ST. PAUL, MI –A heroic 11-year-old who was shot multiple times was able to tell officers before he died that his mother’s boyfriend shot him and killed his mother and sister, according to a criminal complaint filed Tuesday. Tekeith Jones, 26, was charged with three counts of second-degree intentional murder for the shooting deaths of 33-year-old D’Zondria Wallace, 30, her 14-year-old daughter La’Porsha and her 11-year-old son Ja’Corbie at their home in St. Paul on Saturday.

The Minnesota Court of Appeals has affirmed the third-degree murder conviction of former Minneapolis Police officer Mohamed Noor. Noor was convicted of third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in the fatal shooting of Justine Ruszczyk Damond in 2017 while responding to Damond's 911 call about a possible sexual assault behind her south Minneapolis home. His attorneys argued that there was insufficient evidence to convict Noor of third-degree murder and the court wrongly allowed prosecutors to present two expert witnesses who provided similar testimony. The three-judge panel looked at five points in considering his appeal: Whether the evidence at the trial was...

An Indianapolis teen whose dad had just yelled at him for leaving the house without permission turned a gun on his family, killing five relatives, according to authorities and reports Monday. “He shot them!’’ the 17-year-old suspect’s sister screamed in the middle of Sunday’s 3:45 a.m. bloodbath, according to a police report obtained by the local Fox 59 affiliate. The dead were identified as Kezzie Childs, 42, Raymond Childs Jr., 42, their 18-year-old son Elijah, 13-year-old daughter Rita, 19-year-old Kiara Hawkins, and her nearly full-term unborn child, “Baby Boy Hawkins,” according to police and local station WRTV. The alleged killer,...

This is good to have for when the Communist Democrats try to tell us that the protest were peaceful, there were no riots, and absolutely no violence.

MINNEAPOLIS—Overseeing sober living homes for newly recovering drug addicts is difficult in the best of times. But the endless shutdowns have created conditions that are challenging for healthy people, let alone those who are fresh out of rehab, vulnerable, and still reeling. Matt Royce, 35, oversees seven sober-living homes in Minneapolis. All of his houses, each holding between 9 and 13 people, have been “pretty full the whole time.” No overdose deaths had occurred in his homes in almost three years, but last summer he lost two people, while another three were revived from overdoses with opioid-blocker Narcan. Depression has...

Thursday afternoon, Minneapolis Police released body camera footage showing the fatal shooting of a man in south Minneapolis. The shooting happened at about 6:15 p.m. Wednesday at a Holiday gas station near East 36th Street and Cedar Avenue. Police said officers were engaged in a traffic stop with a felony suspect when gunfire was exchanged and the suspect was struck. While police have not yet identified the man, who died at the scene, a person who said he's the victim's father identified the man as 23-year-old Dolal Bayle Idd. The body camera video shows officers that were part of a...

The Minnesota National Guard is preparing for a potentially massive and indefinite deployment early next year, during the high-profile trial of the four former Minneapolis police officers tied to the death of George Floyd, according to an internal plan obtained by 5 INVESTIGATES. The 12-page warning order called "Operation Safety Net" outlines in great detail how the guard will respond to anticipated civil unrest before, during and after the trial of Derek Chauvin, J Alexander Keung, Thomas Lane and Tou Thao. The worst-case scenario calls for all available guard forces in the state to be activated for an indefinite period...

Minneapolis residents, like the droves of fleeing Californians, refuse to learn from experience. They vote for fools, get foolish policies, and act surprised when their voting habits produce utter garbage. An article from December 1st in the Minneapolis Star Tribune ran a headline declaring that a “Staggering” surge in violent carjackings continues across Minneapolis. This was entirely predictable and avoidable, but residents quoted in the piece wanted to support the police reform efforts after the George Floyd overdose. Well, they are living through police reform and don’t like it. This is further proof that however long the phrase “they want...

City council members in Minneapolis appear to be backpedaling after slashing some $8 million from the city's police budget, claiming that 'Defund the Police' was never their 'framework.' In June, Minneapolis city council members Steve Fletcher and Phillipe Cunningham appeared with seven colleagues on a stage bearing a huge sign reading 'Defund Police' during a protest in Powderhorn Park. Now, the duo seem to be mincing words, with Fletcher telling KSTP-TV on Tuesday: ''Defund' is not the framework the council has ever chosen,' as Cunningham audibly agreed.

Minneapolis City Council unanimously approved a controversial budget which is set to move $8million of funding from the police department to violence prevention, mental health services and other programs. Mayor Jacob Frey, who had threatened to veto the entire budget if the council went ahead with a plan to cap police staffing, said the vote was a defining moment for the city which was the first to be hit by anti-police protests following the death of George Floyd. But the city has been plagued by soaring violent crime in the city has soared - with homicide, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary,...

Minneapolis City Council members who tried unsuccessfully to dismantle the police department in response to George Floyd’s death are voting Wednesday on whether to shrink it, a move that could imperil the entire city budget because the mayor is threatening to use his veto to protect public safety amid soaring crime rates. The plan, which supporters call “Safety for All,” is the latest version of the “defund the police” movement that Minneapolis and other cities have considered since Floyd’s May 25 death ignited mass demonstrations against police brutality and a nationwide reckoning with racism. Eleven of the 13 council members...

Violent carjackings shot up 537% in Minneapolis last month compared to data from last November as the city council continues to push defunding the police.