Minneapolis Police Launches Probe Into White Officer Who Punches Black Teen

After a video apparently showing a white police officer punching a Black teenage boy circulated on social media, the Minneapolis Police Department launched an internal affairs investigation. The news came directly from Police Chief Medaria Arradondo and Mayor Jacob Frey, who released a statement to the Associated Press Thursday.

As a heated confrontation unfolded Wednesday night in North Minneapolis, a bystander reportedly recorded part of what happened. Arradondo said that the incident occurred after a violent felony carjacking that involved a few people that started in the suburbs of New Hope. The whole ordeal passed through Robbinsdale and ended up in Minneapolis.

The Minneapolis Racial Justice Network shared a short video of the confrontation on Facebook while noting that as officers were arresting a Black teenager, a few officers surrounded a different Black teenager. Some of the officers, the group further said, held the other Black teenager up while one of them punched him in the head with what appears to be full force.

According to a report from the Star Tribune, a spokesman from the Racial Justice Network said that the group doesn’t know if the teen who received the punch from the officer has suffered any injuries.

Arradondo claims that he doesn’t know if the carjacking suspect and the punched teenager have any connections, but they were both put into custody.

The mayor and the police chief said that the case had been brought to the attention of the police department's internal affairs division. However, they won’t give out any additional details on the incident because the investigation is still in progress. "[Providing more information] would very likely jeopardize the investigation," Frey was quoted as saying.

Arradondo claimed their investigation would be thorough as they can make it, but he won’t commit to releasing any body camera footage of what happened from any of the officers.