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Fmr. Officer Kim Potter Sentenced To 2 Years In Daunte Wright's Death; Kim Potter Sentenced To 16 Months In Prison In Daunte Wright's Death; Today: Biden Holds Call With NATO Allies On Russian Threat; VP Harris Meets With NATO Leaders As Russia Threat Looms; Daunte Wright's Family Reacts To Potter Sentencing. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired February 18, 2022 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[12:00:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE REGINA M. CHU, HENNEPIN COUNTY, MINNESOTA: And to those who disagree and feel a longer prison sentence is appropriate, as difficult as it may be. Please try to emphasize with Ms. Potter's situation. As President Barack Obama once said, learning to stand in somebody else's shoes to see through their eyes, that's how peace begins. And it's up to you to make that happen. Empathy is a quality of character that can change the world.

Officer Kimberly Potter was trying to do the right thing. Of all the jobs and public service, police officers have the most difficult one. They must make snap decisions under chance evolving and everchanging circumstances. They risk their lives every single day in public service. Officer Potter made a mistake that ended tragically. She never intended to hurt anyone. Her conduct cries out for a sentence significantly below the guidelines. OK. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN HOST: Welcome to Inside Politics. You just listened to a courtroom drama this hour in Minnesota. That judge concluded the sentencing hearing for the former police officer Kim Potter, who was convicted of killing 20-year-old Daunte Wright. She was sentenced to two years, two years in prison, 16 months in prison and the remainder under supervised release. And a jury convicted Potter of fatally shooting right during a traffic stop last year.

Today an emotional Judge Regina Chu, called Potter's action, a tragic mistake. And she strayed far from the sentencing guidelines, handing down a less harsh sentence. Wright's family had asked the judge to hand down the maximum amount of time.

CNN's Adrienne Broaddus is joining me now. Adrienne, two years - a two-year sentence versus a maximum of 15 that she could have received. What do you think is the reaction in Minnesota and the reaction from Daunte Wright's family who pleaded just moments ago for a maximum sentence?

ADRIENNE BROADDUS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Abby, I think you will see multiple reactions. There are some people who will be pleased with this sentence. There's another group of people who say this isn't enough. And then there's that set of folks who say, you know, this entire case sucks. There is pain, which was displayed in the courtroom on both sides. As she delivered that sentence. This is something I've never seen in my nearly 20 years of reporting and covering trials, a judge nearly breaking down on the stand.

Judge Chu said, this was an extremely difficult decision for her. She said this is the toughest case she's seen in her entire career. And that sentence for those of you who are just now joining us. Kimberly Potter sentenced to two years in prison. That's 24 months. She will serve two thirds of that time, or 16 months in prison and a third on supervised release. Abby?

PHILLIP: Thank you, Adrienne. I know you're staying on top of this. Let's go in the room here with Elliot Williams, to help us break down what happened here. So, Elliot, the judge made it very clear that she did not believe that these aggravating factors, that the prosecution had said should be considered were justified here. She says Kim Potter did not abuse her position of authority. Potter was trying to do the right thing, and that it required a significantly lower sentence even then what her discretion would have allowed. Tell us about that.

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR & CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right. So, both in the federal and state systems here in Minnesota, they have sentencing guidelines, which are worked out based on the kind of offense, like what the crime was and the circumstances of the defendant, like their criminal history and so on. Here you got a sentencing guideline range of 74 months to 103 months, that's presumptively OK if she'd sentenced them within that range would have stood up in the law.

[12:05:00]

And now she can depart upward or downward depending on the factors she sees, and she focused very heavily on the factors that would have departed downward here, including the fact, the remorse that Kim Potter had shown in the fact that she made the decision, a split- second decision. This is a very low sentence for a manslaughter, just to be perfectly blunt. And it's surprising, like I would have thought, sitting down today, she might have gone to the six month - the six- year range, right around the 74 months.

PHILLIP: Which is what you would have expected potentially, if she were to use the discretion, some discretion even to be a little bit downward, but she seemed to very clearly make the point. This is not similar to the case of the officer who killed George Floyd. She specifically referenced that case and tried to make the point here that Kim Potter is not in need of rehabilitation.

She's not in need of being locked up behind bars. That is, however, obviously cold comfort to the victims here, which would be Daunte Wright's family. How can, you know, the country so dealing with all of this process, what happened in the courtroom here today? And people who might say, this is not justice at all. WILLIAMS: But look, she's right. This is not Derek Chauvin. This is not the same type of crime. And these are the kinds of decisions that judges are forced to make all the time, which is weighing one case against the other. Now, if you are the family of the victim, and you know that the person who killed your son is going to get 16 months, whatever explanation that the judge has given about the rehabilitation of the defendant, simply is just going to ring hollow.

And I would think that, certainly I'm sure we'll hear from the family very shortly, but I'm certain that they'll be very upset by this decision, just based on - she could have acted perfectly within her authority, and still given six or seven years and still been at the lower end of the range that the law would have allowed. So, it is striking and hearing how she laid it out, weighing the different factors. It was striking.

PHILLIP: What do you make of her emotion? I mean, uncharacteristic for a judge on the bench. I mean, she broke down.

WILLIAMS: You know, I am not going to vilify anyone's show of emotion. These having been at sentencing myself, having seen judges and different people react in different ways.

PHILLIP: And this is a tough case.

WILLIAMS: It's a tough case. And it's emotionally fraught. It's socially fraught. This was hard for this judge and there's no question about that. Just looks like the decision she made was kind of a clunker.

PHILLIP: So, I want to go back to Adrienne, because, you know, Elliot brings up a good point that this is going to be obviously cold comfort to this family, who has been through quite a lot. Listening to Daunte Wright's mother earlier today, emphasizing this was her 20-year-old son, a 20-year-old son who had a child of his own. Take us to that family. What do you think is they're going through right now?

BROADDUS: More pain, Abby, more hurt. During that 15-minute break before the sentence died - before the sentence was read by Judge Regina too. Our pool reporter who's inside of the courtroom, spoke with Daunte Wright's brother Damik. And during that short or that brief interaction, he said, Damik, Daunte Wright's brother believe Kim Potter was not remorseful and he called it BS. Those are his words, not mine.

And moments after that is, when we heard Kim Potter turn in the courtroom and address the Wright family. She told them she was sorry. And she told the family that she prays for them and Daunte Wright right all the time. If you go back to just hours ago when Katie Bryant, address the court, she said the one thing she wanted during the course of that trial in December was for Kimberly Potter to turn to her and mouth, if not anything, the words I'm sorry. And she didn't get that.

Well, Potter was on the stand, testifying in her own defense, she never refer to Daunte Wright by his name. She only called him a driver, that hurt. The family reminded the judge today and Kimberly Potter that their son, their nephew, their brother, was a human. He was someone they all love. And something that was striking to me, Abby, and I'm paraphrasing here, we heard from Diamond Wright. That's one of Daunte Wright's sisters. He's a sibling of many.

She mentioned, when her brother was alive, they talked about the killing of George Floyd. And they were with their mother, Daunte Diamond, and saying, and I'm paraphrasing here, that they hope their whiteness would protect them, that they wouldn't be a target by police. But she said today that wasn't the case.

And to quote her, she said, you know, one drop of blackness in their skin and I'm paraphrasing made them a target. So, the question is moving forward, how do we really heal? What does restorative justice look like, and will the Wright family be willing to talk to Kimberly Potter? Abby?

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PHILLIP: We'll be hearing from that family at some point today as they process what happened here. Elliot, just to wrap this up. I mean, is there any more that can come from this? The Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has been very involved in these cases because the spotlight is on Minnesota. Is there anything more that his office can do? Or is this the end of the chapter for this case?

ELLISON: You know, we'll see usually downward departures aren't appealed unless there's no plausible way that anyone could do. I mean, we'd have to look the Minnesota law here, no plausible way that the decision could be supported. And she did lay out her reasons for it, whether they're particularly good ones is an open question.

Now, what needs to happen here is that Kim Potter can lay out a path forward for me ensuring that this doesn't happen again. Start a nonprofit to ensure better training funding. Speak to future officers and use your time as a free citizen to rectify what happened here. Now look, she's free not to, but for the good and healing of the community, it would fall on her to do that.

PHILLIP: As Adrienne mentioned, the family was so disturbed and hurt by a lack of apology, Kim Potter did apologize in the courtroom tearfully today for them too late. But as you point out, she perhaps has an opportunity to take that platform and do something with it. Elliot Williams, thank you so much for being here for that. Coming up next for us, evacuations shelling. The new Russian military exercises an urgent call of NATO allies' oblique American intelligence assessment. The situation in Ukraine hits a new crisis point.

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PHILLIP: And now to Ukraine, today a bleep new American intelligence assessment and 190,000 reasons to doubt Vladimir Putin's word. U.S. officials say an invasion of Ukraine may still happen any day now, set off by a false flag operation. Now, a new American assessment puts the number of Russian troops near Ukraine at just under 200,000.

It confirms what the U.S. and its allies have been saying publicly for days that Russia isn't telling the truth about pulling back its troops. So, now President Biden will convene a call with European and NATO allies. And he also plans an afternoon update on the situation in Ukraine.

CNN is on the frontlines of this story all over the world. And here in Washington, we start our coverage at the White House with CNN's Kaitlan Collins. So, Kaitlan, we will hear from President Biden later today. Why now and what do you expect him to say?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: We expect it to be an update. We'll see if the president has any new intelligence that he's been briefed on to share when he does come out and speak at four o'clock this afternoon. Of course, those remarks are going to come just to several hours after yesterday, he warned that they do believe a Russian invasion of Ukraine could happen basically, any day now.

Now, of course, they haven't been able to pinpoint it. You've seen they've had some dates thrown out there. Those have come and gone. They save it's really difficult to tell because of course, this is all up to Vladimir Putin and what decision he makes. But they are seeing the makings of an invasion before their eyes. They say, with these pretext that you're seeing, basically Russia trying to manufacture a justification for invasion. And that's what you heard Secretary Blinken layout and quite some vivid detail yesterday.

And so, Abby, President Biden will be speaking this afternoon after he has a call with these transatlantic leaders. That is, of course, to talk about the latest that they know about what's going on. It's a call that was pretty abruptly scheduled overnight that the president is going to be having with several world leaders that, he's basically been speaking with on a daily basis about this factor.

And you are right, we have that new 190,000 number that we got from a U.S. ambassador earlier today. If it seems a lot larger than what we had heard earlier this week, and what we had reported on which is about 150,000 Russian forces. That's because in this number they are including those Russian backed separatists in eastern Ukraine. It's not that the number has grown that much in the last several days. But it is a concerning number, of course, for the White House. And we'll hear more from President Biden this afternoon on it.

PHILLIP: Thanks, Kaitlan. I know you'll keep us updated. We're going to go now to Mariupol, Ukraine where CNN's Alex Marquardt is on the ground. And Alex, we are getting word this morning of mass evacuations in the Donbass region, which is where you are. This is after more shelling yesterday, including at an elementary school. Take us through what we know and why all of this matters?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Abby, a number of worrying developments here in eastern Ukraine. Just a short time ago, the authorities in Donbass, which is one of these breakaway enclaves that have been backed by Russia for the past eight years, out of Kyiv's control reported that there was an explosion near their government building. It appears to have been a Russian made car.

We don't know too much more than that. Everything we're hearing out of eastern Ukraine in those Russian backed areas, we're taking not just with a grain of salt, but really with a bag of salt. We did hear from two leaders of those two breakaway enclaves today, calling on their citizens to leave and evacuate to Russia.

They claimed that there was a Ukrainian offensive plan that Ukrainian troops and weaponry have showed up along the border. And so, they are telling their citizens to flee. Of course, we don't have any sense that Ukraine has any intention of doing anything remotely offensive, but this really is something that we're watching closely. Because as you mentioned, Abby, we are on the lookout for some kind of false pretext, some kind of false flag operation that will give Vladimir Putin a justification for launching an invasion into Ukraine.

[12:20:00]

This does come on the heels of a significant spike in ceasefire violations along the so-called line of contact where those Ukrainian forces have been fighting for the past eight years against Russian backed forces. There were 60 of them yesterday, if that was, that's the highest number in about four years. President Putin has warned of a genocide, of course, that is not true. And the Kremlin saying that this is a very dangerous situation. It is, Abby, but it is entirely of their own making.

PHILLIP: Alex Marquardt, I know you're going to keep us updated on the ground there, and also stay safe yourself. But let's go to Munich now, where CNN's Natasha Bertrand is on the ground. Natasha, it's an important test today and this weekend for the Vice President, Kamala Harris, who is on the world stage. What is she expected to accomplish on this trip?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Very important test for the vice president, Abbey. Of course, she has been primarily focused on stemming migration and stemming, you know, those root causes of migration, her emphasis really has been on the southern border. Now, of course, she is kind of thrust into the center of this major international crisis with Russia and Ukraine.

And she's expected to deliver a speech tomorrow here at the Munich Security Conference at the hotel right behind me, essentially laying out how the U.S. is viewing the Russian threat right now, expressing unity with NATO and European allies, and of course, laying out the severe consequences that Russia will suffer if it does, in fact move to invade Ukraine.

She'll also be meeting with Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, tomorrow, who is also in Munich for the weekend, kind of meeting with European and NATO allies. Trying to get a better sense of whether they will be sending more support to Ukraine as they face down this Russian invasion. But really, Vice President Harris's task this weekend has been to express solidarity with European and NATO allies to show Russia that there is a united front here against their aggression.

And U.S. officials say that that message has really come across loud and clear, that they feel that there has been more unity on this issue than they have seen in many years, especially when it comes to Russia. Because as we know, a lot of those European economies are very dependent upon Russia. And so, many might have been very---

PHILLIP: Natasha, I got to pause you here. We're taking now, Daunte Wright's mother Katie Wright, who's speaking now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATIE WRIGHT, MOTHER OF DAUNTE WRIGHT: They're in watch. Pouring my heart out in my victim impact statement that took so long to write and I reread it over and over again, to not get a response out of the judge at all. But then when it came down convicting or to sentencing Kim Potter, she broke out in tears. So once again, we are standing here to say that we're very disappointed in the outcome. Yes, we got a conviction. And we thank everybody for that.

But again, this isn't OK. This is the problem with our justice system today, white women tears Trump, Trump's justice. And I thought my way woman tears would be good enough because they're true and genuine. But when they're co horsed, coached, and taught by the defense attorney, I guess we didn't have a win in this at all. Thank you.

ARBUEY WRIGHT, FATHER OF DAUNTE WRIGHT: I want to just say, you know, I feel cheated. I feel hurt. I'm very upset that my son life was took. And it seemed to me that nobody even cared enough. You know, it was like, they were so tied up into her feelings and what hurt was going on with her that they forgot about my son being killed. Life was took in. And it's just sad to say that, um, I feel like we was tricked. You know, we was limited on everything or what he was saying.

I feel like and, um, it's just sad that our justice system will, you know, we actually thought we was going to get a look justice. You know, nothing could ease our mind from Daunte being killed. But just the fact of knowing that this lady was going to pay for that, it gave us a little sense of hope, like, you know, things were going to get a little bit better but now, I walk out of this courthouse feeling like, people are laughing at us because this lady got a slap on the wrist. And we still every night, sitting around crying, waiting for my son to come home. I'm upset.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[12:25:00]

PHILLIP: You just heard the father of Daunte Wright, Arbuey Wright and his mother Katie, speaking tearfully, painfully about the loss of their son and a sentence of two years handed down to Kim Potter. The police officer who killed him at a traffic stop. We have CNN's Adrienne Broaddus, back with us. Adrienne, we were just discussing how painful this has all been for the family. And you heard Daunte Wright's father, they're saying, we thought we would get a little justice. And we didn't. They are clearly still hurting. What is next for this community?

BROADDUS: That is the big question. Community leaders that I've been in touch with, se this sentence is a smack in the face. Leslie Redmond is the former president of the NAACP in Minneapolis. And she also runs an organization called, "Don't Complain, Activate." She pointed out people, Adrienne, are serving time for non-violent offenses. We're talking about people in Minnesota, who haven't even killed anyone.

Yes, the community is grateful that there was some form of accountability, but in their eyes, this is not justice. This is the same community that is healing beyond - behind the killing of George Floyd. And during this news conference with attorneys who represent Daunte Wright. You heard Attorney Ben Crump, talk about Mohamed Noor. That's the black officer who shot and killed a white woman from Australia. In that case, there was no departure. Abby?

PHILLIP: Thanks, Adrienne. And Elliot, you just heard Adrienne bring up Mohamed Noor. What is the significance of the judge saying, this was an accident? Kim Potter did not mean to pull her gun. Does that matter in a case like this? It seems that it very much did.

WILLIAMS: Yes. It's sort of yes and no. Look, it's manslaughter in the first degree in Minnesota. So, it - which is in effect, an accidental killing, the very killing that she's charged with is an accident. What the judge was saying, is that not all accidents are created equal. And this was an officer in the heat of the moment attempting to, you know, as the judge laid out, protect other officers from harm or defuse the situation or so on.

Again, it's an interesting way to have cut up the facts here based on everything we know. And frankly, the egregiousness of the mistake and the mishandling of the firearm. So yes, it's an accident. But again, you can't judge all accidents equally, and I think.

PHILLIP: And at the end of the day, I think we have to remember that someone's life was cut short here. And this family is not seeing this as justice in any way. We'll be right back.

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