Major testifies Minneapolis police deleted texts after Floyd protests

Minnesota state police Maj. Joseph J. Dwyer testified in court in July that police deleted texts and emails after protests in the area over the killing by police of George Floyd.

Although there was no order by supervisors to delete the communications, Dwyer said it was “really a standard practice over the course of time that we remove, you know, delete text messages, delete e-mail messages,” according to court records filed Friday, KSTP reported.

There is no schedule for when troopers need to delete communications and it all depends on the officer, according to Dwyer. 

Dwyer admitted to the deletion of communications during a court case brought against the state of Minnesota and state police by the Minnesota American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) chapter on behalf of journalists.

“The State Patrol’s destruction of emails and text messages after the George Floyd protests was an attempt to cover up their unlawful conduct,” the ACLU said in the court filing. 

The lawsuit claims law enforcement officers assaulted journalists who were trying to cover the protests that took place in 2020. 

The protests lasted for days after Floyd died in police custody. Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison after his conviction for the murder of Floyd.

“The purge was neither accidental, automated nor routine,” ACLU lawyers said in the court filings, according to The New York Times. “The absence of both contemporaneous communications and documentation makes it nearly impossible to track the State Patrol’s behavior, apparently by design.”

Bruce Gordon, director of communications for the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, said in a statement to The Hill the state police “follows all state and agency data retention requirements.”

“In addition, there is a litigation hold for all data related to this case,” Gordon added.

The department had no further comment since the litigation is ongoing.