74 Seconds Podcast: To be black and armed in Minnesota
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In July 2016, police officer Jeronimo Yanez shot Philando Castile during a traffic stop. Yanez has been charged with manslaughter. Reporters from MPR News will follow the case, beginning with the traffic stop, in a new podcast called "74 Seconds."
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Seventy-four seconds is the amount of time that elapsed between the moment Yanez turned on his squad car lights to the moment he fired the seventh and final shot into Castile's car.
Episodes launched May 22, and our coverage continues after the trial: On the podcast, on the radio and on our website at mprnews.org/74seconds.
To be black and armed in Minnesota
Until last July, Euric Rutherford had never been to a protest over police shootings. He joined the crowd at the Minnesota governor's mansion on Summit Avenue the night after Philando Castile was killed.
"It's getting to the point where I'm being looked at as a violent person just because of the color of my skin," he said that night.
Rutherford carries a gun because he believes in exercising his Second Amendment right: He likes the sport of it, and he wants to be able to protect himself and his family. His wife, who is white, was originally against it.
Rutherford is 33 — the same age Castile would be now. He's black. He has young children. And he's a gun owner, with a permit to carry.
"There's this fear about a black man with a gun," said Lucky Rosenbloom, a firearms trainer — who says he's likely the only African-American trainer in the state of Minnesota.
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