Minneapolis Police Department officers reported using physical force against suspects more than 1,000 times in 2022, one of the highest per-capita rates of police force in the nation, according to data released this week.
MPD officers reported using force at the same rate in 2022 as they did in 2020, the year George Floyd was murdered by MPD officers, led by Derek Chauvin.
Over the same time period, police use of force rose precipitously in neighboring St. Paul, roughly doubling from 2018 to 2022, according to the data. On a per-capita basis, St. Paul police are now more likely to use force against suspects than MPD officers.
Proximity, they’re both pulling from the same labor pool, but there’s less scrutiny on their department so they pull in worse people. Probably some combination of all of that.