MINNEAPOLIS — St. Paul police applied for a standard search warrant for the predawn raid in downtown Minneapolis that ended in the shooting death of Amir Locke, but were overruled by Minneapolis police, who wanted to carry out a no-knock operation, according to a source.
Locke was shot shortly before 7 a.m. Wednesday while on a couch during the execution of a search warrant involving a St. Paul homicide. Body camera footage released late Thursday showed a Minneapolis police SWAT team using a key to quietly unlock the apartment before barging in yelling "search warrant" as Locke lay under a blanket on the couch. Lock stirred and was shot within seconds as his hand could be seen on a gun.
The case has revived a simmering debate about the use of no-knock search warrants, which critics say unnecessarily escalate encounters.
A source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the case, said that St. Paul police filed standard applications for a search warrant affidavit for three separate apartments in the Bolero Flats Apartment Homes, at 1117 S. Marquette Av., earlier this week.
But Minneapolis police insisted that, if their officers were to execute the search within its jurisdiction, St. Paul police must first secure "no-knock" warrants instead, the Star Tribune has confirmed. MPD would not have agreed to execute the search otherwise, according to a law enforcement source who asked to remain anonymous so they could discuss an ongoing investigation. St. Paul police very rarely execute no-knock warrants because they are considered high-risk.
Interim Minneapolis police chief Amelia Huffman said at a news briefing after the footage was released Thursday that "both a knock and no-knock search warrant were obtained" for three locations within Bolero Flats, but did not elaborate.
The revelation comes as Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman announced that he is again turning to the state Attorney General's Office for reviewing the killing of the 22-year-old Locke during a raid this week in a downtown Minneapolis apartment.
In a statement issued Friday morning, Freeman's office said Attorney General Keith Ellison has agreed "to partner with the Hennepin County Attorney's Office in its review of the tragic death of Amir Locke. ... This follows the previous constructive partnerships in the successful prosecutions of Derek Chauvin and Kimberly Potter in recent police shooting cases."
Derek Chauvin is serving a 22 1/2 -year sentence for the killing of George Floyd during his detention at a south Minneapolis intersection in May 2020. Potter is awaiting sentencing on Feb. 18 after she was convicted of manslaughter for the April 2021 death of Daunte Wright during a police traffic stop in Brooklyn Center.
Freeman said that his chief criminal deputy, Daniel Mabley, will lead his office's role in the review of Locke's death.
"We will be working with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to ensure a thorough and complete evaluation," Freeman's statement continued. "Thereafter we will decide together, based on the law and evidence, whether criminal charges should be brought."
Following Freeman's announcement Ellison's role in reviewing the shooting, the attorney general issued a statement that said, "Amir Locke's life mattered. He was only 22 years old and had his whole life ahead of him. His family and friends must now live the rest of their lives without him. I promise the Locke family and all Minnesotans that we will work with the Hennepin County Attorney's Office to conduct a fair and thorough review of the BCA investigation and that we will be guided by the values of accountability and transparency."
Also Friday morning, a leading state gun rights group contended that Locke acting legally when he armed himself as several Minneapolis police SWAT officers rushed into the downtown apartment, which family members say belonged to a relative.
The assessment from the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus comes after the city released police body-worn camera video showing the officers entering the unit in the Bolero Flats As Locke stirred, his right hand could be seen holding a gun, and within seconds one of them opened fire and fatally wounded the young man.
As seen in the video, "Mr. Locke appears to be sleeping on the couch during the execution of a no-knock warrant," read a statement from Bryan Strawser, who chairs the caucus. "He is awoken with a confusing array of commands coming from multiple officers who are pointing lights and firearms at him."
Rob Doar, a caucus senior vice president, said that Locke "did what many of us might do in the same confusing circumstances. He read for a legal means of self-defense while he sought to understand what was happening."
Doar asserted that "the tragic circumstances of Mr. Locke's death were completely avoidable. It's yet another example where a no-knock warrant has resulted in the death of an innocent person."
Locke's family has said he owned the gun and had a permit to carry. Doar said that no permit to carry would have been necessary for Locke, as he was in a private residence. There is also no gun registration or licensing to own in Minnesota, so it's irrelevant whether or not he owned the gun, as he is not prohibited from possessing a firearm, according to Minnesota court records.
Amir Locke's parents, Andre Locke and Karen Wells, declined Thursday to comment about the shooting, other than his mother saying, "We want justice for our son." Jeff Storms, an attorney representing the family, confirmed earlier Thursday that Locke's family viewed the video before its release.
Storms is partnering with civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who has won significant financial settlements for several families across the country who have lost loved ones to police violence in recent years, including a record $27 million settlement with the city of Minneapolis for Floyd's family.
Crump and Storms said Amir Locke has several family members in law enforcement, has no criminal history and was in legal possession of the gun at the time of his death.
The Locke family plans to hold a news conference Friday morning.
Nekima Levy Armstrong spoke to Interim Police Chief Huffman and Mayor Frey at a briefing following the release of police body camera footage of the shooting death of Amir Locke.
Authorities identified the officer who fired the fatal shots as Mark Hanneman. Huffman coordinated the video release with investigators at the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) "without compromising the integrity of their investigation or their ability to collect evidence," read a statement from City Hall.
In a statement released after the shooting, Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis president Sgt. Sherral Schmidt said the union was thankful that all of the officers involved were "safe." She said that Hanneman was forced to make a "split-second decision to save his life and the lives of fellow officers."
After the shooting, the BCA obtained a warrant to search the apartment and retrieve evidence, according to an affidavit supporting the warrant. They inventoried three 9mm spent shell casings, presumably fired from Hanneman's gun, as well other items. They also recovered a pistol from the living room.
Wednesday's shooting renewed questions about the use of no-knock search warrants.
The use of these unannounced raids, which allow police to enter a property without announcing their presence beforehand, have been banned in cities across the country after they resulted in the deaths of innocent civilians. Minneapolis restricted the practice in 2020, but it is still occasionally used in certain cases.
While police have defended the use of no-knock raids as necessary for keeping officers safe while apprehending violent suspects, critics say it puts lives at risk.
Paul Applebaum, private defense attorney, said no-knock warrants are often used in drug and violent crime cases, but that with the expansion of surveillance technology police should be able to apprehend a suspect without such a show of force.
"It seems like the risk is greater than the reward of preserving evidence or not having a shootout or all that," said Applebaum, who has sued officers for alleged misconduct. "It's like, just go sit in the lobby behind a newspaper and wait until he comes out."
Another problem, he says, is that judges tend to be deferential to law enforcement, signing off on no-knock warrants "without thinking about the potential repercussions if something goes wrong."
"And this is what happens," he said.
Under the current Minneapolis policy, officers must identify themselves as "police" and announce their purpose as "search warrant" before entering any domicile — regardless of whether a judge signed off on an "unannounced" or "no-knock" entry. Once inside a residence, officers are supposed to periodically repeat those announcements in case occupants didn't hear them. The same rules, which mirror those already in place across the river in St. Paul, also apply for arrest warrants.
The practice, most often used by SWAT officers, should help maintain the element of surprise and preservation of evidence while eliminating confusion about who's entering the building, a police spokesman said at the time.
Policy dictates that no-knock warrants would be acceptable only in high-risk circumstances such as a hostage situation, when "giving an announcement would create an imminent threat
of physical harm to victims, officers or the public." Some exceptions apply, but investigators need to obtain permission from the chief of police or his or her designee.
In the past, MPD executed an average of 139 no-knock warrants a year.
The American Civil Liberties Union urged law enforcement agencies to ban no-knock warrants following the death of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, who was shot eight times by police on
March 13, 2020 after three narcotics officers used a no-knock warrant to bust down the door of her apartment during a late-night drug investigation.
Her boyfriend mistook the raid for a home invasion and fired back, striking a detective. Police were looking for Taylor's ex, who was already in custody. No drugs were found.
In Minnesota, the debate surrounding the use of these surprise raids reached the politically divided Legislature, which passed new regulations on the raids as part of a broader public safety deal.
Levy-Armstrong, who joined other activists in lobbying for a ban on the practice, said Thursday that that Locke's killing raises key questions about why police didn't appear to know who was in the apartment and seemingly acted "without any checks and balances."
"I think this underscores the need for statewide reform because of policing," she said.
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