Court filings: Minneapolis uses coaching to discipline officers for more than minor misconduct

[WhiskeyGrinder]

https://minnesotareformer.com/2023/08/09/court-filings-minneapolis-uses-coaching-to-discipline-officers-for-more-than-minor-misconduct/

The Minneapolis Police Department has been using “coaching” instead of official discipline on wayward officers who are accused of more than just minor infractions, and the city has been withholding documents about it, according to recent filings in a public records lawsuit.

The case has hinged on the meaning of the word “discipline.” When MPD disciplines an officer, that becomes a public record. But when they “coach” an officer, the city does not consider that discipline and thus withholds records of the incidents from the public.

The plaintiff says coaching is just another form of discipline, and records of coaching should be public.

The city claims coaching is not discipline.

But newly unearthed evidence shows the city often internally contradicts the claims it’s now making in court and does indeed refer to coaching as discipline.

The city’s latest response: Nevermind — those are just words.

An assistant city attorney wrote in a recent court filing that just because “a few documents may use the word ‘discipline’ in the context of coaching does not transform a process that the relevant parties uniformly treat as non-disciplinary into something else.”

lol jesus christ

[ret5hd]

1. Coaching: "here's how you get by with that."

Discipline: “here’s a few extra days of paid vacation…but we have to call it paid suspension.”

[WhiskeyGrinder]

2. Some examples from the DOJ report:

https://www.fox9.com/news/city-dont-mind-the-words-discipline-not-discipline

The report describes a 2019 case of "egregious misconduct" where an officer "smacked, kicked, and used a taser on a teen accused of shoplifting."

The officer called the teen a "mother---er," and conducted an interrogation without a Miranda warning. The case was referred for coaching, but there was no indication any coaching occurred, the DOJ report said.

In another case, an MPD sex crimes sergeant used her personal cell phone to contact a sexual assault survivor and inadvertently sent the woman a picture of a "partially unclothed man." The sergeant was referred for coaching, but there was no indication coaching occurred. The complaint was dismissed four years later because the "Reckoning Period Expired."