🎙️ Voice is AI-generated. Inconsistencies may occur.
The Minnesota judge who presided over Derek Chauvin's murder trial was likely the one who signed the no-knock warrant that led to last week's fatal shooting of Amir Locke.
While the search warrant is currently not being shared with the public, Matt Lehman, a Hennepin County District Court spokesman, said in a statement to NBC News that Judge Peter Cahill was the signing judge on duty last week. Also, two anonymous sources told Minneapolis' WCCO-TV that Cahill had signed the warrant that led to Minneapolis police shooting Locke, a 22-year-old Black man.
Though Locke was not the target of the warrant, he was sleeping at an apartment connected to a homicide investigation. Having just been awoken from sleep, he reached for his legally obtained firearm and pointed it at police, at which point an officer fatally shot Locke.
Cahill was at the center of public attention last year when he oversaw the trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin, who was convicted of second- and third-degree murder in the 2020 death of George Floyd.
Floyd's death became a focus of the Black Lives Matter movement. Two years later, people continue to protest police killings of Black Americans, with a crowd of hundreds taking to the streets of Minneapolis again to protest Locke's death over the weekend, according to NBC.
Newsweek previously reported that Locke's mother, Karen Wells, said Locke was sleeping at his cousin's home at the time of the shooting and was a "law-abiding citizen" with no criminal record. Interim Police Chief Amelia Huffman said at a Thursday news conference it was unclear if Locke was connected to the homicide investigation.
In a statement, the Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis said the officer who shot Locke had to make a quick decision in a "high-risk situation."
"No officer goes into a dangerous setting like this wanting to use a weapon," the statement said. "That decision was not taken lightly, and the impact of the use of deadly force will affect these officers, their families and the family of Mr. Locke for the rest of their lives."
Since the fatal shooting, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey has issued a moratorium temporarily blocking no-knock warrants. In a statement, Ben Crump, an attorney for Locke's family and the families of several other notable people killed or injured by police, called for an end to these types of warrants.
"Like the case of Breonna Taylor, the tragic killing of Amir Locke shows a pattern of no-knock warrants having deadly consequences for Black Americans," he said. "This is yet another example of why we need to put an end to these kinds of search warrants so that one day, Black Americans will be able to sleep safely in their beds at night."
In Lehman's statement, he added that Cahill cannot comment on the warrant application because the state's judicial conduct code "prohibits judges or Court staff from commenting on active or pending cases."
Update 2/7/2022 2:06 p.m.: This story has been updated with additional information.
