MINNEAPOLIS — On Friday, attorney Jeff Storms and the family of Leneal Frazier, who was killed when a Minneapolis squad car hit his car while pursuing another vehicle, are holding a press conference to discuss Frazier's death. Storms is the co-counsel of civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who has been retained to represent Frazier’s family.
The press conference can be viewed here:
Surveillance video obtained by KARE 11 shows the moment that a Minneapolis squad car collided with another vehicle during a pursuit early Tuesday morning, killing a driver unconnected to the chase.
The video, recorded by cameras at a gas station near the intersection of Lyndale Avenue and 41st Street, shows a police cruiser striking a vehicle crossing the intersection before then colliding with another vehicle.
Immediately following the crash, Minneapolis Police Spokesman John Elder told reporters that the officer was pursuing an armed robbery suspect on Lyndale Avenue when the police cruiser entered the intersection at 41st Street and hit a car driving westbound. It then hit another vehicle traveling south on Lyndale. The driver of the westbound vehicle, later identified by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner as 40-year-old Leneal Frazier, was killed.
Darnella Frazier, the Minneapolis teen who recorded the viral video of George Floyd's murder, posted on her Facebook page Tuesday evening that Leneal was her uncle.
In the post, which was accompanied by a photo of Leneal, Darnella wrote that the Minneapolis police "took an innocent life trying to catch someone else" and questioned why the officers continued the pursuit.
A GoFundMe has been set up to support Frazier's family and cover funeral costs. According to the GoFundMe page, Leneal Frazier was a father of six and had one grandchild. "He was one of the sweetest people you will ever meet," the post reads.
On Wednesday, an MPD incident report identified the officer involved as Brian Cummings.
In a post on his Facebook page Thursday, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey called Frazier's death a "horrific tragedy."
"Darnella, Leneal’s family, and Minneapolis’ Black community have borne the weight of more trauma over the last year than anyone, let alone any young person, should be expected to endure in a life time," Frey wrote. "The State is handling the investigation, and our local government will be cooperating fully to help ensure a transparent process. We updated the department’s pursuit policy in 2019 to make it far more restrictive and will again be reviewing the that policy, independent of the investigation."