MINNEAPOLIS — The Hennepin County Attorney’s office has declined to charge a man who drove through a crowd of protesters in Minneapolis last fall, knocking over and slightly injuring a teenage girl.

In a statement Thursday, the county attorney’s office said the 40-year-old St. Paul man could not be prosecuted under the statute it considered, which addresses drivers’ actions after being involved in a crash.

Within hours after the announcement, Minneapolis police said they will send the case to the city attorney’s office for possible misdemeanor charges.

The man drove into a crowd of people protesting the grand jury decision in November not to indict a white police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old in Ferguson, Missouri.