Derek Chauvin: George Floyd’s killer could face more charges
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who was convicted this week of killing George Floyd, could face more charges over alleged violent conduct.
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Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin could face more charges over alleged violent conduct.
According to Fox News, The US Justice Department is considering whether to charge the convicted officer over a 2017 incident in which he allegedly violently handled a 14-year-old boy and held the teenager down with his knee for almost 17 minutes.
US media reported in the months leading up to Chauvin’s trial for killing George Floyd, Minnesota prosecutors had attempted to use video evidence from at least one of his prior arrests but the trial judge denied the request.
The DOJ is said to be now mulling over whether to file charges against the ex-cop for his actions in the video.
State prosecutor Matthew Frank, who argued for the video to be used in Chauvin’s trial, said the body camera footage of the incident with the 14-year-old shows “Chauvin’s use of unreasonable force towards this child and complete disdain for his well-being.”
The video allegedly shows Chauvin dealing aggressively with the boy after responding to a domestic violence call with another officer in September 2017.
The teenage boy was reportedly one of two people who were accused of assaulting his mother.
CHAUVIN SEGREGATED IN JAIL
Chauvin was put into a prison’s segregated housing unit for his own safety, a prison spokesperson said, after Chauvin was found guilty of the murder of George Floyd on Tuesday (local time).
Chauvin is reportedly on suicide watch as he spent his first night in jail after being found guilty of murder.
The Minnesota Department of Corrections also released the new booking photo on Wednesday morning (local time). The 45-year-old former policeman dressed in an orange jumpsuit appeared tired with puffy eyes and messy hair.
Chauvin will likely be sentenced in around eight weeks Judge Peter Cahill said after the verdict, with a precise date to be announced.
Although Chauvin had been out on bail since October, Judge Cahill revoked bail after the verdict and the former police officer will now await sentencing in jail.
After the verdict, Chauvin was taken to the Minnesota Correctional Facility-Oak Park Heights to await sentencing, Department of Corrections spokesperson Sarah Fitzgerald said.
Ms Fitzgerald told CNN that Chauvin was placed in an “administrative control unit”, a housing unit that is separated from the general population.
“He is on ‘administrative segregation’ status for his safety,” Ms Fitzgerald told CNN. “Administrative segregation is used when someone’s presence in the general population is a safety concern.”
Chauvin could face up to 40 years in jail for second-degree murder, up to 25 years for third-degree murder, and up to 10 years for manslaughter.
But given Chauvin has no prior criminal record, Minnesota’s guidelines say that for such a person, the presumptive sentence for both second-degree and third-degree murder is 12.5 years. The judge is given discretion to hand down a sentence between 10 years and eight months and 15 years for each.
It comes as US Attorney-General Merrick Garland announced on Wednesday (local time) that a civil investigation into the police department of Minneapolis, Minnesota, a day after Chauvin was convicted of murdering Floyd.
“Today, I am announcing that the Justice Department has opened a civil investigation to determine whether the Minneapolis Police Department engages in a pattern or practice of unconstitutional or unlawful policing,” Mr Garland said.
He said the civil probe -- separate from an ongoing criminal investigation into Floyd’s death -- will examine whether the police systematically engaged in the use of excessive force, including during legal protests.
It will also examine whether the city force showed a pattern of discrimination and unlawful treatment of people with behavioural health disabilities, Mr Garland said.
If evidence is found of a pattern of unlawful practices, the investigation could possibly lead to a civil lawsuit seeking to compel the city to undertake sweeping reforms of its police department.
“The Justice department will be unwavering in its pursuit of equal justice under law,” Mr Garland said.
COP CONVICTED OF MURDER
Chauvin was convicted on all charges on Tuesday (local time) over the death of Floyd by a jury in the Hennepin County court in Minneapolis.
The 12 jurors found him guilty of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in Floyd’s death in May 2020.
Chauvin was handcuffed and taken into custody after being convicted on all charges in the death of Floyd.
The swift and emphatic verdict was reached after just 10 hours of deliberations and the jury didn’t ask any follow up questions about the evidence.
Speaking after the verdict, US President Joe Biden said the conviction of Floyd’s killer would spark widespread police reform and “could be a giant step forward in the march toward justice in America.”
“It was a murder in the full light of day and it ripped the blinders off for the whole world to see, the systemic racism … that is a stain on our nation’s soul,” Mr Biden said.
“The murder of George Floyd launched a summer of protests we hadn’t seen since the civil rights era in the 60s. Protests that unified people of every race and generation, in peace and with purpose, to say enough, enough, enough of these senseless killings.
“Today’s verdict was a step forward.”
Mr Biden said that police brutality convictions were rare and that Chauvin was brought to justice by a “confluence of factors”.
He described: “A brave young woman with a smartphone camera. A crowd that was traumatised, traumatised witnesses. A murder that lasts almost 10 minutes, in broad daylight, probably (for) the whole world to see.”
He said that while most police officers “serve their communities honourably”, that “those few who fail to meet that standard must be held accountable and they were today”.
“No-one should be above the law and today’s verdict sends that message, but it’s not enough and we can’t stop here,” Mr Biden said.
“This takes acknowledging and confronting head-on the racial disparities that exist in policing and in the criminal justice system more broadly.”
Chauvin was found guilty of the more serious count of second degree murder and if Judge Peter Cahill finds there were “aggravating factors”, he faces up 40 years in jail.
Minnesota Attorney-General Keith Ellison, who led Chauvin’s prosecution, said the verdict “showed that nobody is beneath the law and no-one is above it”.
America was bracing for more civil unrest ahead of the verdict, with 3000 National Guard Troops deployed in Minneapolis, where city streets were boarded up.
Chauvin’s trial drew intense political focus, with President Joe Biden having earlier appeared to call for a guilty verdict.
Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Floyd’s name would “always be synonymous with justice”.
“Thank you George Floyd for sacrificing your life for justice,” Mrs Pelosi said.
“Because of you and because of thousands, millions of people around the world who came out for justice, your name will always be synonymous with justice.”
Chauvin was convicted of murder and manslaughter in the death of African-American Floyd in a case that roiled the United States for almost a year, laying bare deep racial divisions.
A racially-diverse jury of seven women and five men in the Midwestern city of Minneapolis took less than two days at the end of a three-week trial to find the white officer guilty in unanimous decisions on all three charges he faced.
Former President Barack Obama said in a statement that the “jury did the right thing”.
“But true justice requires much more. Michelle and I send our prayers to the Floyd family, and we stand with all those who are committed to guaranteeing every American the full measure of justice that George and so many others have been denied,” Mr Obama said.
“True justice requires that we come to terms with the fact that Black Americans are treated differently, every day.”
‘WE ARE ABLE TO BREATHE AGAIN’
Floyd’s family welcomed the verdict. “I got messages from all over the world; Ghana, London … saying ‘we can’t breathe until you can breathe’,” Floyd’s bother, Philonese, said.
“Well, today we are able to breathe again. Justice for George means freedom for all.”
President Biden watched the verdict from the White House and along with Vice President Kamala Harris and First Lady Jill Biden, called Mr Floyd’s family shortly afterwards.
“Nothing is going to make it all better but at least now there is some justice,” Mr Biden told them
“We are all so relieved, not to get one verdict, but all three … it’s really important.”
He also pledged police reform, saying “we’re going to get a lot more done”
“This can be our first shot against … at dealing genuinely with systemic racism,” Mr Biden said.
Residents in Minneapolis said they were relieved at the outcome and hoped it would prevent more damaging unrest.
Law professor Joe Daly said the mood in the city had been “sad, angry, nervous, frightened” as people gathered there in recent days ahead of the verdict.
“There’s a great sense of relief,” he told News Corp after the verdict.
“There was there was genuine fear that this city could explode. It could erupt. And if you look at all of the boarded up windows, not just in the downtown area, but all around …
“There’s the National Guard and their humvees. The presence of police, not only just police from this state, but police from other states.
“They were very, very concerned about the people erupting in terms of a not-guilty verdict.”
LANDMARK CASE
The case is a landmark test of police accountability. Chauvin had a record of using excessive force before Floyd died under his knee in a crime prosecutors branded a “shocking abuse of authority.”
Chauvin, described by colleagues as rigid and silent, knelt on the 46-year-old Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes on a Minneapolis street on May 25 last year, despite the dying man’s pleas and those of shocked passers-by who filmed the tragedy.
The guilty verdict amounts to one of the most high-profile, high-stakes US court results in decades.
Chauvin’s lawyer Eric Nelson has said his client “exuded a calm and professional demeanour” in his interactions with Floyd, and sought to convince the jury that the white ex-cop only applied a hold that was authorised and consistent with his training.
But the prosecution argued, successfully, that Chauvin had used excessive force — not only with Floyd, but with others he arrested during his 19-year career on the force.
During closing arguments Monday, prosecuting lawyer Steve Schleicher described Chauvin’s actions as a “shocking abuse of authority” against Floyd.
“This wasn’t policing, this was murder,” Mr Schleicher said.
Forty-five witnesses were called to the stand over nearly three weeks of testimony in Hennepin County District Court — 38 of them brought to the stand by state prosecutors.
The four-member prosecution team, led by Assistant State Attorney-General Matthew Frank, focused repeatedly on viral video footage of Floyd’s death, which included Chauvin pressing his knee on the man’s neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds.
Prosecutors contend that Floyd died of asphyxiation as a result of the restraint, with Chauvin seen keeping his knee on his neck even after paramedics arrived at the scene and found Floyd had no pulse.
But Chauvin’s lawyer Eric Nelson hinged his case on three assertions: that Floyd died due to drug use and a heart ailment; that an unruly crowd of bystanders posed a threat and distracted the cop and that Chauvin followed his training in using the restraint.
BIDEN ‘PRAYED’ FOR VERDICT
Earlier, US President Joe Biden had called for the “right” verdict in the trial.
Speaking prior to the outcome, Mr Biden said: “I’m praying the verdict is the right verdict. I think (it’s) … overwhelming in my view,” Mr Biden told reporters at the White House, noting that he was only speaking openly because the jury has been sequestered.
Mr Biden, who spoke with the Floyd family after jurors began to deliberate in the case, said they were feeling “pressure and anxiety”.
“I’ve come to know George’s family … And his brother, both brothers,” Mr Biden said.
Mr Biden said that he held off placing the call until closing arguments were done so that he wasn’t seen as applying pressure to jurors — as Democrat Maxine Waters stands accused of doing.
“I waited until the jury was sequestered and I called,” Mr Biden said, without directly mentioning controversy over inflammatory remarks from Ms Waters.
Mr Chauvin’s lawyer, Eric Nelson, asked the judge to declare a mistrial after Ms Waters attended a protest in Minnesota and called for a guilty verdict and more demonstrations.
“I hope that we are going to get a verdict that will say, guilty, guilty, guilty,” Ms Waters said. “We’ve got to stay in the street and we’ve got to demand justice.”
The visibly frustrated judge denied the request but said, “I wish that elected officials would stop talking about this case.”
“They’re a good family,” Mr Biden said. “And they’re calling for peace and tranquillity.”
Mr Biden has repeatedly denounced Floyd’s death but had previously stopped short of weighing in on the trial itself. His comments came as his administration has been privately weighing how to handle the upcoming verdict, including considering whether Biden should address the nation and dispatching specially trained community facilitators from the Justice Department, aides and officials told reporters.
The jury resumed deliberations Tuesday morning (local time) after spending a few hours Monday discussing the case behind closed doors.
Floyd’s death triggered nationwide protests and rioting last year — causing up to $US2 billion (A$2.5 billion) in damage, according to insurance company estimates.
Chauvin was charged with murder and manslaughter over Floyd’s death in May 2020, which sparked protests against racial injustice around the world and has become a landmark test of police accountability in the United States.
Chauvin was captured on video kneeling on Floyd’s neck, as the latter was pinned facedown and handcuffed on the ground for more than nine minutes saying, “I can’t breathe.”
In his instructions to the jury, the judge touched on the significance of the case, which comes amid heightened tensions fuelled by other police killings.
“You must not let bias, prejudice, passion, sympathy or public opinion influence your decision,” Judge Peter Cahill said.
“You must not consider any consequences or penalties that might follow from your verdict.” Prosecutors, in closing arguments to the jury, which will be sequestered during deliberations, repeatedly showed the harrowing video seen by millions around the world.
“This case is exactly what you thought when you saw it first, when you saw that video,” prosecutor Steve Schleicher told the jury.
“You can believe your eyes,” Mr Schleicher said. “It’s exactly what you knew, it’s what you felt in your gut, it’s what you now know in your heart.”
“This wasn’t policing, this was murder,” Mr Schleicher said.
“Nine minutes and 29 seconds of shocking abuse of authority.
“The defendant is guilty of all three counts. And there’s no excuse.”
Mr Nelson told the jury they need to look at Chauvin’s actions “from the perspective of a reasonable police officer”.
“He did not purposefully use unlawful force,” Mr Nelson said. “This was not a neck restraint. This was not a chokehold.”
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Originally published as Derek Chauvin: George Floyd’s killer could face more charges
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