The presentation to law enforcement officers had an eye-opening title: “Remorse to Redemption: Lessons Learned.” One speaker was to be Kim Potter, a white former Minneapolis-area police officer who was convicted of manslaughter in the high-profile killing of Daunte Wright, an unarmed Black driver, during a traffic stop in 2021. Potter served 16 months in prison and testified that she had mistaken her handgun for a Taser when she fatally shot Wright, who was 20. Potter’s message — on the ramifications of using force and ways to avoid it — will not be heard by officers working for the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis oversight agency. In an abrupt turnaround, the agency canceled Potter’s training amid media inquiries about her presentation, which was set for Vancouver next week The Seattle Times, had raised questions about Potter’s involvement, the New York Times reports. The decision to bring in Potter was made by “well-meaning” officers in the agency’s leadership “who were looking to learn from someone’s mistakes,” said agency board chair David Postman.
"This decision was made without the conversation that needs to happen around issues like this,” said Postman, who took part in a move to rescind Potter’s invitation to speak to the 100-officer agency. The debate over her address underscored starkly different perspectives on the treatment of police officers after wrongdoing. One view is to allow remorseful police officers to use their experiences to teach others. The other is that they are the wrong messengers and should be excluded from public discussion because of the suffering they can evoke. Katie Wright, the mother of Daunte Wright, felt as if she had been “punched in the stomach” when she first heard of plans to feature Potter in the presentation. Potter, she added, was not showing remorse and was “only opening up the wound and hurting our family again.” For Minnesota’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, the cancellation of Potter’s talk is a missed opportunity. “The loss of a child under the circumstances in which Daunte Wright died is deeply painful, and there is just really no way to help anyone understand how bad it feels,” said Ellison, whose office took over the prosecution of Potter’s case.