Associated Press
MINNEAPOLIS — A former Minneapolis police officer was sentenced Wednesday to nine months in the county workhouse, with eligibility for electric home monitoring in three months, after the officer pleaded guilty to criminal vehicular homicide in a high-speed chase that killed a bystander two years ago.
Prosecutors said former officer Brian Cummings was pursuing a suspected car thief on July 6, 2021, when he ran a red light and hit a car driven by Leneal Frazier, 40, of St. Paul, who died at the scene.
Frazier, a father of six children, was an uncle of Darnella Frazier, who shot the cellphone video of George Floyd’s death when former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck in 2020.
Cummings was driving nearly 80 mph (129 kph) in Minneapolis with his siren and lights activated when his squad car slammed into the vehicle, officials said. The crash ended a chase that lasted more than 20 blocks, including through residential neighborhoods where the posted speed limit was 25 mph (40 kph).
Cummings, who had family and some colleagues there in support, addressed the court by offering “my most heartfelt apology in the untimely death of Mr. Frazier,” according to the Tribune.
“I’d like to take this time to acknowledge the great pain and suffering the Frazier family is experiencing,” he said, adding that he hopes the Fraziers can find “peace and healing, too.”