2021 police killing of a man in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Law enforcement authorities fatally shot Winston Boogie Smith Jr., a 32-year-old black American man, in the Uptown area of Minneapolis at 2:08p.m.CDT on June 3, 2021. Smith was being pursued by a U.S. Marshals Service task force that apprehends wanted fugitives. The arrest operation had the participation of undercover agents from several local police agencies in Minnesota. The officers did not use body cameras or dashcams when apprehending Smith. Controversy over the lack of law enforcement footage of the arrest operation led to local police agencies ceasing aid to the Marshals Service's fugitive task force, and to changes to body and dash camera policies by the Marshals and other federal law enforcement agencies.
Several protests were held in reaction to Smith's killing, beginning on June 3, and the Uptown area experienced civil disorder over the subsequent weeks. Deona Marie Knajdek was killed and three others were injured on June 13 after a man rammed his vehicle into a group of demonstrators who had blockaded a street. In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, law enforcement authorities said publicly that Smith failed to comply with arresting officers and had brandished a gun. An attorney for the passenger in the vehicle with Smith contradicted the law enforcement description of events. The passenger had not seen a gun on Smith or in the vehicle.
An investigation of law enforcement conduct by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) after the shooting said that Smith had brandished a firearm at officers who attempted to arrest him. Authorities said they found a loaded 380 handgun with matching spent shell casings in the vehicle Smith occupied, and that ballistic evidence and DNA samples supported their claim that Smith had fired the weapon during the June 3 encounter. The report also revealed that the passenger had ducked for cover after pleading with Smith to surrender and that she did not visually witness the exchange of gunfire.
The BCA sent the case to the Crow Wing County attorney's office to determine if the officers who shot Smith should face criminal charges. In his report, Donald Ryan, the attorney for Crow Wing County, said that the officers’ actions were justified under Minnesota Statutes and that no criminal charges should be filed against them. During the investigation and for several years afterward, it was believed that there was no video evidence of the shooting, but a private investigation as part of a civil suit was able recover a 35-second video filmed by Smith on his cellphone.
People involved.
Winston Boogie Smith Jr..
Winston Boogie Smith Jr. was a 32-year-old black American man who resided in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He spent his early life in south Minneapolis. He attended Coon Rapids High School. As a musician, he went by the nickname Wince Me Boi. He was also known for comedy videos and performance activism that he posted online. Smith was a father of three.
Smith was convicted previously of first-degree aggravated robbery related to a 2017 assault and robbery of his ex-girlfriend. He was sentenced to a 48-month prison term but was released on parole. The conviction also barred Smith from possessing a firearm. Smith was arrested on a probation violation in November 2019 when officers found a loaded handgun under the driver's seat of his car. He was subsequently charged in Ramsey County court for illegally possessing a firearm. Smith pled guilty to the weapons charge in November 2020 on the day before the trial was scheduled to start. Smith later sought to withdraw the guilty plea, which would have resulted in four years of prison time, but was denied by a judge.
In 2020, police in Bloomington, Minnesota, attempted to arrest Smith on several local warrants. Smith, who was in a parking lot at the Mall of America, allegedly fled in his vehicle. At the same time, police gave chase on Interstate 494 as Smith allegedly drove at high speed in the opposite direction of traffic. Police ended the pursuit due to concerns over public safety. Smith later faced charges in Hennepin County related to the incident and had a court hearing scheduled for September 2021.
Smith missed a May 19, 2021, sentencing hearing, and a new warrant in Minnesota was issued for his arrest, and he was ordered to be held without bond or bail. An internal police document included a quote from Smith that he might "shoot it out" if authorities tried to apprehend him. Smith had been active on social media, where in addition to posting his music, comedy sketches, and photos of family and friends, he had been outspoken about police killings of black men, such as George Floyd and Daunte Wright. He also spoke about his own upcoming sentencing, not wanting to spend four years in jail, and how he was not guilty of the weapons charge he was facing. He also compared his situation to video footage he had seen of Dolal Idd, a Somali-American man who was killed by Minneapolis police in an exchange of gunfire on December 30, 2020. Two of Smith's postings to social media had suggested support for violence against police.
Vehicle passenger.
On the afternoon of June 3, 2021, Smith was inside a stationary Maserati SUV with a female passenger, Norhan Askar, on the fifth floor of a parking ramp, after eating at a nearby restaurant.
Law enforcement.
A U.S. Marshals Service task force that apprehends wanted fugitives had been pursuing the arrest of Smith, for whom an arrest warrant had been issued after he missed a sentencing date in May about a weapons charge. Authorities were monitoring Smith's social media posts, which included content of him brandishing a firearm and offering drugs and weapons for sale. Undercover officers from the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office and Ramsey County Sheriff's Office—two local police agencies in Minnesota—assisted in the effort to apprehend Smith. The operation also had the participation of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Minnesota Department of Corrections, and the Anoka County Sheriff's Office. The Minneapolis Police Department did not assist the federal task force operation to apprehend Smith though it occurred inside their municipal jurisdiction.
Incident.
On June 3, 2021, Smith had posted on Instagram that he was at Stella's Fish Café, a restaurant on West Lake Street, near Seven Points, in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis. A Ramsey County sheriff's deputy who was monitoring Smith's social media accounts alerted the federal task force of Smith's whereabouts. At least nine task force officers took positions to watch Smith and attempt to apprehend him. Just after 2:00 p.m. CDT, the task force officers observed as Smith and Askar departed the restaurant and made their way to a Maserati vehicle atop a parking ramp near West Lake Street and Girard Avenue South. Smith and Askar were sitting inside the stationary vehicle when undercover law enforcement agents surrounded them in seven unmarked vehicles. The task force members activated their lights and sirens and used their vehicles to block the Maserati vehicle.
For several minutes, task force members in tactical gear repeatedly told Smith he was under arrest, to put his hands up, and exit the vehicle—commands that a citizen bystander overheard. Smith refused to comply and said to Askar that he did not want to go to jail and that he was going to die.
The officers attempted to break the windows of the Maserati to extract Smith. Smith, who had been holding a cellphone in an attempt to begin a Facebook livestream, dropped it and reached into the back seat to grab an item. According to law enforcement accounts of the incident, Smith then brandished a gun and fired it from inside his vehicle. At 2:08p.m.CDT, the Hennepin County and Ramsey County officers fired fifteen rounds, striking Smith. Medical aid rendered at the scene was unsuccessful and Smith died at 2:11p.m.
Askar was injured from flying glass and taken to Hennepin County Medical Center for treatment. No officers were injured.
Civil unrest.
Uptown protests and disorder.
Protests began on June 3, 2021, and continued for several days, primarily in the Uptown area of Minneapolis. Minneapolis police made several arrests for looting and rioting during the overnight hours of June 3 and 4. Over the next several days, demonstrators intermittently held portions of West Lake Street near where Smith was killed by blocking the road to vehicular traffic with makeshift barriers, and city officials sent crews to remove barricades and reopen the street to vehicle traffic. Nightly demonstrations were held through mid July and unrest continued for several months. The slogans, “No Justice, No Street!” and "Winston Smith Was Assassinated”, were used by activists in reaction to Smith's death.
Vehicle-ramming attack.
On June 13, 2021, Deona Marie Knajdek (also reported as Deona Marie Erickson), a protester, was killed and three others were injured when a vehicle rammed into a blockade at the intersection of West Lake Street and Girard Avenue. The driver, Nicholas Kraus, a 35-year old man from Saint Paul, Minnesota, pleaded guilty in late 2022 to the charges of unintentional murder for Knajdek's death and second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon for injuring another protester.
Investigation.
Minneapolis police response.
Minneapolis police officers who arrived at the scene and were wearing body cameras interviewed Askar. In their video footage, Askar said she pleaded with Smith to put his hands up and comply with the officers, but he refused and said he did not want to go to jail and that he was going to die. She also gave a statement to Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension agents, when she said that the incident happened fast and that she did not remember seeing a gun in Smith's vehicle. Askar said she did not visually witness the shooting as she had ducked for cover, and she expressed confusion afterwards about whether a shooting had occurred.
Reaction by civil rights activists.
Civil rights activists and Smith's friends and family disputed the law enforcement accounts of the incident. Smith's family held a press conference on June 4 outside the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension building in Saint Paul to demanded greater law enforcement transparency and the release of any surveillance footage that might have captured the incident. Local organization Communities United Against Police Brutality held a separate press conference near the shooting site on June 4 to call for officials to release video footage and other details of the shooting.
Initial incident report.
According to the U.S. Marshals Service in a statement they released soon after the incident, Smith had failed to comply with orders from apprehending officers, and that he produced a handgun, which resulted in the task force firing at him. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) said in a preliminary report that Smith had fired a gun at the apprehending officers from inside of his vehicle, and that authorities recovered a handgun and spent ammunition cartridges from the driver's side of his vehicle. According to court documents and officer conduct report, investigators at the scene recovered from Smith's vehicle a Smith &amp; Wesson M&amp;P .380 handgun loaded with one live cartridge on the driver's side and six spent Blazer 380 Auto cartridge cases, as well as an empty gun magazine that was inside a duffel bag. Outside the passenger's side of Smith's vehicle, investigators recovered fifteen (another source says fourteen) FC 9mm Luger cartridge cases from where the officers had fired. Several bullet fragments were recovered from inside the vehicle.
Autopsy.
An autopsy report issued by the medical examiner's office for Hennepin County ruled the manner of Smith's death, which occurred at 2:11p.m.CDT on June 3, 2021, to be a homicide from multiple gunshot wounds. According to attorneys for Askar, the BCA did not take gunshot residue samples from Smith before his body was washed by the medical examiner, evidence they felt could exonerate Smith from the BCA claim that he possessed and fired a gun. The BCA said in response that it believed that such tests would have been inconclusive and opted instead for DNA testing and other examinations of the gun recovered in Smith's vehicle.
Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.
In the immediate aftermath of the officer-involved shooting, per state law, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) began an investigation of officer conduct. The officers who shot at Smith were placed on administrative leave, a standard protocol, pending further investigation. The BCA did not publicly name the officers who shot at Smith as Minnesota Statutes prevented release of undercover agents' identities. The