Passenger In Daunte Wright’s Car Testifies on 2nd Day of Kim Potter Trial, Defense Calls for Mistrial

In court Thursday, Alayna Albrecht-Payton testified that she and Daunte Wright had just started dating before he was shot and killed by former Minnesota officer Kim Potter on April 11.

She said tried to stop the bleeding using just a piece of clothing and a belt she found in the car.

“We were never really official because we didn’t get the chance to,” she said, according to CNN.

On the second day of trial, the jury heard from Albrecht-Payton, responding officers, Alan Salvosa and Daniel Irish, medics, and the family of an 86-year-old man who was in his car when Wright’s vehicle crashed into him.

Potter is facing first and second-degree manslaughter charges. She claims that she meant to use her taser when she fatally shot the 20-year-old father during a traffic stop.

Albrecht-Payton apologized to Wright’s mother, who took the stand on Wednesday. “No mom should have to see their son dead on the phone, on a video call out of nowhere,” she said. Wright’s mother, Katie, testified that she was frantically trying to call her son when he hung up on her during the traffic stop. The final time she called using FaceTime and Albrecht-Payton answered and put the camera on Wright.

The next to testify was 84-year-old Patricia Lundgren who said Wright’s car crashed into her and her 86-year-old husband’s vehicle after the shooting, before it crashed into a fence.

Potter had drawn what she thought was her taser when Wright was able to free himself from an officer’s grip to get in his car. After Potter shot him, Wright put the car in drive. Lundgren’s husband is now in hospice care and Albrecht-Payton suffered a concussion and fractured jaw in the crash.

Videos of the aftermath played as the responding officers testified. Body camera footage showed an officer taking Albrecht-Payton out of the car and putting her arms behind her back as he told another officer, “I don’t know what’s going on.”

Officers Salvosa and Irish attempted to perform life saving measures before medics, Mike Morelock and Dustin Johnson, arrived, KARE 11 reports. Both medics also testified that they tried everything they could to revive Wright before tending to the others injured in the crash.

Before court adjourned for the day, Potter’s attorney Paul Engh asked for a mistrial.

From KARE 11:

As the day came to a close defense attorney Paul Engh asked Judge Chu for a mistrial, claiming the defense was “concerned with the presentation of the state’s case,” and that an “unending” amount of time was spent on prejudicial evidence that he said lacked relevance to what really matters in the case.”

Prosecutor Matthew Frank told Judge Chu the evidence presented goes toward the state’s Blakely evidence, which they need to prove aggravating factors to get a lengthier sentence than state guidelines call for if there is a guilty verdict. He told Chu he didn’t believe the presentation of any of the state’s evidence rose to the level of a mistrial.

Judge Chu denied the defense’s motion.

Court is scheduled to resume Friday morning at 10 a.m.

“I replay that image in my head daily,” Albrecht-Payton said, recalling her frantic efforts to help Wright while he gasped for air in the driver’s seat.