ST PAUL, Minn. — EDITOR'S NOTE: The video above originally aired in April 2022.
The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) has released a detailed report on the use of no-knock warrants by law enforcement agencies in the state in 2022.
The numbers included one fatality tied to the execution of a no-knock warrant, involving the police shooting of Amir Locke in February 2022.
The BCA report shows 185 no-knock search warrants were requested and 179 were issued statewide in 2022. A similar report for 2021 showed 132 requests and 129 warrants were granted that year; however, the 2021 report is only a partial figure for the year starting in September 2021, when the state law requiring the data began.
The data shows that while 179 no-knock search warrants were issued in 2022, there were 158 actually executed, with 148 of those warrants resulting in law enforcement locating the evidence they were seeking.
The BCA said that no-knock search warrants don't always involve entering a building; most of the warrants executed statewide in 2022 (80 of 158) resulted in non-entry searches, such as K-9 searches and placement of vehicle trackers; 63 cases involved an actual no-knock entry; 15 cases ultimately used a knock-and-announce entry.
The Hennepin County Sheriff's Office had the highest number of no-knock search warrant requests across the state in 2022 (76 requested, 75 granted, 64 executed, 14 as no-knock entries), followed by the Brooklyn Park Police Department (14 requested, 10 issued, 9 executed, 5 as no-knock entries), Minneapolis Police Department (11 requested, 11 granted, 9 executed, 7 as no-knock entries) and St. Cloud Police Department (11 requested, 11 granted, 11 executed, 8 as no-knock entries).
In Hennepin County, the vast majority of no-knock warrants requested involved drug violations (61 requested, 60 granted, 52 executed), followed by weapons violations (12 requested, 12 granted, 11 executed).
The data also broke down no-knock warrants by the race of the subject involved. Of the 222 people statewide who were subjects of a no-knock warrant where race was identified, 126 were Black, 77 were white, 14 were Native American, and 5 were Asian.
The BCA data also examines injuries and fatalities connected to no-knock search warrants. The report shows four cases in which a no-knock warrant led to an injured subject: two involving the Wright County Sheriff's Office, and one each involving the Brooklyn Park Police Department and Hennepin County Sheriff's Office.
Nine people who were not the subject of the warrant (listed as "other involved" in the report) were injured during the execution of a no-knock warrant in 2022, and one person was killed. While that death is not specifically identified in the report, the death of Amir Locke was connected to a no-knock search warrant in February 2022 at an apartment in Minneapolis. Police were looking for Locke's cousin in connection with a St. Paul murder; when officers entered the apartment, Locke was asleep on a couch; body camera footage showed that Locke woke up and reached for his legally-permitted handgun when he was shot by officers.
Locke's death prompted calls for changes to no-knock warrant policies statewide. As part of the Public Safety Bill passed by the Minnesota Legislature in the 2023 session, lawmakers limited, but did not ban, the ability of judges to approve no-knock warrants, requiring that “the occupant or occupants of the dwelling will present an immediate threat of death or injury to the officers executing the warrant if the officers announce their presence or purpose prior to entering the dwelling.”
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