FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Thursday, June 9, 2022
Contact:
Chris Mulcahey
Minnesota Supreme Court Hears Upper Midwest Law Center Appeal in MPD Funding Case
Upper Midwest Law Center is seeking a reversal of the Minnesota Court of Appeals March 2021 decision
Golden Valley, MN – Today, the Minnesota Supreme Court heard the Upper Midwest Law Center’s expedited review of the Court of Appeals decision in Spann v Minneapolis City Council that gave the mayor the power to unilaterally dismantle the Minneapolis Police Department by not recognizing the requirements set out in the City Charter.
The Hennepin County District Court sided with UMLC in the summer of 2021 and ruled that Minneapolis must fund and employ at least 730 sworn police officers by June 30, 2022. The Minnesota Court of Appeals reversed the lower court’s decision in March. The Upper Midwest Law Center now requests that the Supreme Court reverse the Court of Appeals and send this case back to the district court for the City to show compliance with the law.
“We presented a strong case today that the Minneapolis City Charter requires the city council to fund and the mayor to employ and maintain a police force of 731 officers,” said James Dickey, Senior Trial Lawyer at Upper Midwest Law Center. “Our clients continue to suffer because of the understaffed and underfunded police department. We are confident that the Supreme Court will turn this case back to the district court so the city can show whether they really have taken every effort to meet the Charter requirement.”
“I have lived in Jordan and Hawthorne all my life and I am not moving,” said Georgianna Yantos, one of the plaintiffs in this case. “The criminals have to move, and we need help from the mayor and the city– whatever it takes.”
The Upper Midwest Law Center filed the original lawsuit on behalf of the petitioners, eight Black and White residents of Minneapolis’ historic and diverse Jordan and Hawthorne neighborhoods, which have borne the brunt of an inadequate number of uniformed police officers on the embattled North Side.
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Upper Midwest Law Center is a non-profit, public interest law firm with the mission to initiate pro-freedom litigation to protect against constitutional violations, government overreach, special interest agendas and public union corruption and abuses. UMLC is a 501(c)(3) organization.
