Has any Minnesota police department released video of unusual or viral street stunts leading to chases in the past five years?
Executive summary
Yes — multiple Minnesota law‑enforcement agencies have released or been the subject of widely shared video showing dangerous, attention‑seeking street stunts that either provoked or became part of subsequent police responses and chases in the past five years; notable published examples include Minneapolis footage of a Kia “skirting past” a squad car and an Eagan patrol video showing deployment of a Grappler to stop a fleeing truck, while numerous other chases captured on camera have been reported by local outlets [1] [2] [3] [4]. Reporting and official dashboards make clear that video evidence has become a central part of how pursuits and decisions about whether to engage are scrutinized, but there is no single public repository in the reporting provided that catalogs every department release statewide [5].
1. Viral taunts in Minneapolis: video, public scrutiny, and a non‑pursuit policy
A widely circulated clip showed a Kia apparently “skirting past” a Minneapolis squad car as teenagers were accused of taunting officers, and the Minneapolis Police Chief publicly defended the decision not to initiate a pursuit — citing policy that limits pursuit when a stolen vehicle does not involve force, weapons or immediate threats of violence [1]. Local reporting framed the interaction as a viral stunt that tested the department’s pursuit rules and triggered debate about when officers should chase; the station’s coverage quotes departmental explanation for restraint and situates the footage in a larger conversation about safety versus enforcement [1].
2. New technology enters the frame: Eagan’s Grappler video
In a different vein, an Eagan police video released to the public showed the department using a Grappler device to snag a trailer tire and bring a truck pursuit to an end — the clip was presented by local TV as the first on‑camera demonstration in Minnesota of that specific intervention [2]. That footage functions less as a viral stunt and more as an operational record that both illustrates and justifies the tactic, and its publication underscores how departments are increasingly comfortable releasing material that explains tactical choices to the public [2].
3. Widespread chase footage, patchwork reporting, and the State Patrol’s data transparency
Beyond isolated viral clips, Minnesota news outlets have repeatedly published videos and eyewitness footage of chases — from a cross‑county late‑night pursuit that began in Minneapolis and ended in St. Michael to stolen‑vehicle chases and other high‑speed incidents documented by local reporters and aggregators like MNCRIME [3] [4] [6]. The Minnesota Department of Public Safety maintains a pursuits and use‑of‑force dashboard that centralizes pursuit instances for the State Patrol, signaling an institutional move toward transparency, but the dashboard does not replace department‑level video releases nor provide a comprehensive catalog of viral street‑stunt videos across every local agency [5].
4. Contextual caveats: what the reporting doesn’t show and competing narratives
The sources confirm specific instances where video was released or widely circulated, yet the reporting does not offer a definitive, statewide inventory of every department’s video releases tied to “street stunts” over the five‑year window; the evidence is therefore anecdotal and illustrative rather than exhaustive [5] [1] [2]. Additionally, other recent high‑profile Minnesota videos — notably bystander recordings of separate deadly encounters involving federal agents — have fueled partisan interpretations and show how visual evidence can be used to advance divergent narratives about policing and pursuit tactics, a dynamic reporters and fact‑checkers have documented [7] [8] [9]. Readers should therefore treat the documented examples as representative cases that demonstrate a pattern — departments releasing or being implicated in viral pursuit videos — while acknowledging gaps in any single public record compiled in the supplied reporting.