Police chief’s call about fired officers in George Floyd’s death as family take action
The US police chief who fired four officers over George Floyd’s death has made a stunning admission about their conduct, as the dead black man’s family is getting their own independent autopsy. WARNING: Graphic
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The Minneapolis police chief who fired four officers over George Floyd’s death has made a stunning admission about their conduct, as the dead black man’s family has hired an independent medical examiner.
Police Chief Medaria Arradondo said in his mind they all bear the same responsibility.
“Mr. Floyd died in our hands and so I see that as being complicit,” Chief Arradondo told CNN.
“Silence and inaction, you’re complicit. If there was one solitary voice that would have intervened ... that’s what I would have hoped for.”
He called the killing a “violation of humanity”.
“There are absolute truths in life; we need air to breathe,” he said.
“The killing of Mr Floyd was an absolute truth that it was wrong.
“I did not need days or weeks or months or processes or bureaucracies to tell me what occurred out here last Monday was wrong.”
In a statement filed in the District Court in Minnesota on Friday last week, the officers “made several attempts to get Mr Floyd in the back seat” of the car.
It claims Mr Floyd “did not voluntarily get in the car and struggled with the officers by intentionally falling down, saying he was not going in the car, and refusing to stand still”.
Police were originally called to a grocery store after Floyd allegedly paid using a fake $20 note.
In a 911 call, Floyd was observed to be “awfully drunk” and “not in control of himself”.
With Derek Chauvin’s knee on the back of his neck, he could be heard repeatedly saying: “I can’t breathe.”
A complaint filed in the District Court against Chauvin alleges he had his knee on Floyd’s neck for eight minutes and 46 seconds.
The other officers involved were Tou Thao, J Alexander Kueng and Thomas K. Lane. They have all been fired.
But an autopsy from the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office said the combined effects of being restrained, potential intoxicants in Floyd’s system and his underlying health issues, including heart disease, likely contributed to his death.
Civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump said the family has hired forensic pathologists Dr Michael Baden and Dr Allecia Wilson who will reveal the findings of their own independent autopsy.
Dr Baden was previously chief medical examiner in New York City.
Mr Crump said they were “tragically disappointed” by the findings in the first report.
“We hope that this does not reflect efforts to create a false narrative for the reason George Floyd died,” he said.
“Attempts to avoid the hard truth will not stand, and on behalf of the family, we are fiercely committed to bringing the truth to light.”
FLOYD’S LAST MOMENTS ON CAMERA
A new video has emerged revealing the last moments of George Floyd’s life.
The video, posted by controversial American civil rights and Black Lives Matter activist Shaun King, appears to show Mr Floyd in a violent struggle inside a police car last Monday, after they tried to arrest him in Minneapolis.
Mr King said the short video showed Mr Floyd being beaten, but it is unclear what is happening in the car.
His Instagram post of the video carried the caption: “It’s all coming together. Police were in the car beating the s**t out of George Floyd. One stands watch, while the others attacked him.”
In the criminal complaint laid on Friday against his alleged killer, prosecutors said the 46-year-old father of two resisted arrest.
He did not voluntarily get in the squad car and “struggled with the officers by intentionally falling down”, the papers said.
TRUCK DRIVES THROUGH CROWDS OF PROTESTORS
It comes as the driver of a semi trailer drove through crowds of protesters who had blocked a Minneapolis highway bridge was arrested.
In photos from the scene, he emerged with minor injuries, reportedly sustained from contact with the crowd he drove his tanker truck through.
It was unclear how many people were injured or if the driver, who was moving at speed, had tried to brake when he saw the massed protesters on the 1-35W bridge, about 5.30pm local time on Sunday (8.30am AEST).
Horrifying traffic cam video captured the incident and showed the truck mobbed by protesters afterwards.
The driver was arrested and there were no injuries, according to the Associated Press.
SECRET SERVICE AGENTS TAKE TRUMP TO BUNKER
Secret Service agents rushed US President Donald Trump to a White House bunker as hundreds of protesters gathered outside the executive mansion, some of them throwing rocks and tugging at police barricades.
Trump spent nearly an hour in the bunker, which was designed for use in emergencies like terrorist attacks, according to a Republican close to the White House who was not authorised to publicly discuss private matters and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The account was confirmed by an administration official who also on condition of anonymity.
The abrupt decision by the agents underscored the rattled mood inside the White House, where the chants from protesters in Lafayette Park could be heard all weekend and Secret Service agents and law enforcement officers struggled to contain the crowds.
Friday’s protests were triggered by the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after he was pinned at the neck by a white Minneapolis police officer.
The demonstrations in Washington turned violent and appeared to catch officers by surprise. They sparked one of the highest alerts on the White House complex since the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001 .
“The White House does not comment on security protocols and decisions,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere.
The Secret Service said it does not discuss the means and methods of its protective operations. The president’s move to the bunker was first reported by The New York Times.
The president and his family have been shaken by the size and venom of the crowds, according to the Republican. It was not immediately clear if first lady Melania Trump and the couple’s 14-year-old son, Barron, joined the president in the bunker. Secret Service protocol would have called for all those under the agency’s protection to be in the underground shelter.
MORRISON ‘SHOCKED’ BY FLOYD’S DEATH
Prime Minister Scott Morrison does not believe violent protests in the United States will bring change after the shocking death of African-American man George Floyd.
America has been gripped by violence with protests boiling over he died after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck while he was under arrest.
The Australian prime minister said the footage from the US was disturbing.
“I saw a good meme on the weekend - Martin Luther King didn’t change anything by burning anything down or by looting any shops,” he told 2GB on Monday.
Mr Morrison said video of the officer kneeling on Mr Floyd’s neck was awful.
“As upsetting and terrible that the murder that took place - and it is shocking, that also just made me cringe - I just think to myself how wonderful a country is Australia.”
He cautioned against similar demonstrations in Australia turning violent, with local protests planned for later this week.
“There’s no need to import things happening in other countries here to Australia,” Mr Morrison said.
“Australia is not the United States. The United States is a great country. They’re a great friend of Australia and they’re going through a difficult time. We wish them all the best as they deal with that.”
PROTESTERS DESCEND ON WHITE HOUSE
After a violent night of looting and fires, about 1,000 protesters occupied part of Layfayette Park across from the White House on Sunday evening local time to condemn the death of George Floyd at police hands in Minnesota. Police in riot gear lined up behind a set of barricades.
The mood was defiant. Protesters called the police murderers and traitors. Tear gas was fired. They chanted “No justice, no peace, no racist police.” The crowd focused on one black police officer, asking him to show support for the protest. “Please black man, take a knee,” protesters told him. “The whole world would see it.
The protesters had marched to the White House from Howard University. After arriving at the park, they pushed through the original barricades that had been set up. But at least at the start, the demonstration was peaceful. The protest Saturday night turned violent as darkness set in. Protesters set fires, smashed windows and sprayed graffiti.
LOOTERS DESTROY STORES
Brazen daylight looters have been filmed emptying out stores in multiple US cities from Los Angeles to Chicago and Philadelphia.
In Santa Monica, police “have completely lost control of (the) situation”, as luxury stores are being emptied.
More than 40 cities across 20 states announced curfews for Sunday night (local time), and about 5000 National Guard soldiers and airmen were activated in 15 states and Washington DC.
A further 2000 troops have been placed on standby, according to Fox News.
State and local law enforcement remain responsible for security, but the Guard will assist the officers.
TRUMP TARGETS NEW TERROR GROUP
Far-left anarchist group Antifa will be designated a terrorist organisation, as authorities try to clamp down on extremists who are inflaming race riots across America.
US President Donald Trump said “Antifa and the Radical Left” were responsible for stoking the unrest.
“Avoid large gatherings. Follow the advice of local authorities and monitor local media.”
The White House has increasingly said Antifa, a militant coalition which stands for “anti fascists” and seeks to physically confront and bring down the far-right, are turning major cities across the country into war zones.
“This is being driven by Antifa,” national security adviser Robert O’Brien said on Sunday, local time.
“And they did it in Seattle. They have done it in Portland. They have done it in Berkeley. This is a destructive force of radical — I don’t even know if we want to call them leftists.
“Whatever they are, they’re — they’re militants who are coming in and burning our cities, and we’re going to get to the bottom of it.”
It comes as Australians in the US have been warned to avoid mass gatherings.
“There are protests taking place in a number of US cities and some have announced curfews,” said a new warning on the Australian government’s Smartraveller site.
US Attorney General Bill Barr said the Justice Department would use “our existing network of 56 regional FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces” to go after extremists.
“The voices of peaceful protest are being hijacked by radical elements,” he said.
“Groups of outside radicals and agitators are exploiting the situation to pursue their own separate and violent agenda.
“In many places it appears the violence is planned, organised and driven by anarchic and far-left extremist groups using Antifa-like tactics.”
Mr Barr said US Attorney Officers, the FBI, US Marshals, DEA and ATF would support state and local law enforcement.
Extremist groups would also be prosecuted using a 1968 anti-rioting law, he said.
Other authorities have laid the blame more broadly, with Minnesota’s Democratic governor saying their rioters included white supremacists and cartel members.
And Republican Senator Marco Rubio said the rioters “don’t fit a simple left vs. right identity” and they included the far right Boogaloo group, which aims to start a new civil war.
“In city after city we have a rogues gallery of terrorists from Antifa to ‘Boogaloo’ groups encouraging & committing violence,” he said.
“They may not be ideologically compatible but share a hatred of govt & police & are taking advantage of the protests.”
TRUMP ‘KEPT PUSHING ME OFF ON PHONE CALL’
George Floyd’s brother has hit out at Donald Trump following a phone call where the US President “did not give him an opportunity to speak”.
Mr Trump last week said he had contacted Mr Floyd’s family following the death of the 46-year-old African American man, where he “expressed his sorrow”.
Mr Trump also said “that was a horrible thing to witness” and said it “looked like there was no excuse” for Floyd’s death.
But Philonise Floyd claimed it was a one-way conversation when Mr Trump called him following the tragic incident.
“He didn’t give me an opportunity to even speak,” Philonise told MSNBC. “It was hard. I was trying to talk to him, but he just kept, like, pushing me off, like ‘I don’t want to hear what you’re talking about.’
“And I just told him, I want justice. I said that I couldn’t believe that they committed a modern-day lynching in broad daylight.”
George Floyd’s family is under unimaginable pain and news coverage. Please provide money to them directly to allow for one of their worries not having to be about money. https://t.co/rN3FndhI5j
— BLM (@hvrnon) May 30, 2020
At least 13 Philadelphia cops were injured, and there were multiple shootings in Indianapolis.
President Trump threatened to unleash “vicious dogs” on anyone who breached the White House as the National Guard joined the Secret Service in a cordon to defend the building against a rowdy crowd.
Minneapolis, where George Floyd’s on-camera death happened after he was pinned for almost nine minutes beneath a white officer’s knee last Monday sparked this powder keg, suffered through its fifth straight night of chaos.
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz said the state was deploying 11,000 National Guard troops, its entire force, for the first time in history.
“The situation in Minneapolis is no longer in any way about the murder of George Floyd,” said Mr Walz.
“It is about attacking civil society, instilling fear and disrupting our great cities.”
Mr Walz earlier said Minneapolis was being targeted by extremists and organised groups, including drug cartels, white supremacists and far-left Antifa thugs.
Entire blocks of the Midwest city have smouldered for days, leaving a trail of ransacked stores and burnt-out buildings and destroying at least 170 local businesses.
Police there took their first major victory about 9pm local time, pushing back protesters who had besieged the inner-city Fifth Precinct. This was the police station where Mohamed Noor, the rookie cop who shot dead former Sydney life-coach in 2017, worked.
There were dozens of arrests overnight, according to Department of Corrections Commission Paul Schnell.
Officer Derek Chauvin was on Friday charged with murdering Mr Floyd. The delay in charges against his three colleagues, who also leaned on Mr Floyd, further inflamed protests.
According to the White House, more than 80 per cent of the rioters tearing through the twin cities of Minneapolis and St Paul were from out of state.
President Trump has reportedly put the Army’s Military Police on four hour notice to step in, for the first time since 1992.
In a speech following the successful SpaceX NASA launch in Cape Canaveral, he called for calm and said the country would not fall to anarchists.
“I understand the pain that people are feeling,” he said.
“We support the right of peaceful protesters, and we hear their pleas. But what we are now seeing on the streets of our cities has nothing to do with justice or with peace.
“The memory of George Floyd is being dishonoured by rioters, looters, and anarchists. The violence and vandalism is being led by Antifa and other radical left-wing groups who are terrorising the innocent, destroying jobs, hurting businesses, and burning down buildings.
“The main victims of this horrible, horrible situation are the citizens who live in these once lovely communities. The mobs are devastating the life’s work of good people and destroying their dreams. Right now, America needs creation, not destruction; co-operation, not contempt; security, not anarchy. And there will be no anarchy. Civilisation must be cherished, defended, and protected. The voices of law-abiding citizens must be heard.”
They were hit with pepper spray, tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets, many engaging in rolling battles with law enforcement.
The unrest spread to dozens more cities, including Tulsa, Oklahoma, where 300 black people were massacred in 1921, and Tallahassee, Florida, where a pick-up truck ploughed through a crowd of protesters.
LA’s up-market cafe-lined Fairfax district resembled a war zone as dozens of riot-squad officers tried to enforce an 8pm curfew amid trashfires and destroyed businesses.
The city deployed its National Guard for the first time in almost 30 years, since the 1992 Rodney King riots.
Eleven states and Washington DC activated their National Guard and at least 25 cities imposed curfews.
GLOBAL PROTESTS EXPLODE
Meanwhile, unrest over the killing of Floyd spread overseas, with thousands of protesters gathering in London, Berlin and Toronto.
Racism-tinged events no longer startle even America’s closest allies, though many have watched coverage of the often-violent protests with growing unease.
Burning cars and riot police in the US featured on newspaper front pages around the globe on Sunday, bumping news of the COVID-19 pandemic to second-tier status in some places.
Floyd’s death on May 25 in Minneapolis was the latest in a series of deaths of black men and women at the hands of police in the US.
Thousands gathered in central London on Sunday to offer support for American demonstrators. Chanting “No justice! No peace!” and waving placards with the words “How many more?” at Trafalgar Square, the protesters ignored UK government rules banning crowds because of the pandemic. Police didn’t stop them.
Demonstrators then marched to the US Embassy, where a long line of officers surrounded the building. Several hundred milled around in the street and waved placards.
Protesters in Denmark also converged on the US Embassy on Sunday.
Participants carried placards with messages such as “Stop Killing Black People.”
The US Embassy in Berlin was the scene of protests on Saturday under the motto: “Justice for George Floyd.”
Several hundred more people took to the streets Sunday in the capital’s Kreuzberg area, carrying signs with slogans like “Silence is Violence,” “Hold Cops Accountable,” and “Who Do You Call When Police Murder?” No incidents were reported.
Germany’s top-selling Bild newspaper on Sunday carried the sensational headline “This killer-cop set America ablaze” with an arrow pointing to a photo of now- fired police officer Derek Chauvin, who has been charged with third-degree murder in Floyd’s death, with his knee on Floyd’s neck.
The newspaper’s story reported “scenes like out of a civil war.”
In Italy, the Corriere della Sera newspaper’s senior US correspondent Massimo Gaggi wrote that the reaction to Floyd’s killing was “different” than previous cases of black Americans killed by police and the ensuring violence. “There are exasperated black movements that no longer preach nonviolent resistance,” Gaggi wrote, noting the Minnesota governor’s warning that “anarchist and white supremacy groups are trying to fuel the chaos.”
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George Floyd killing rocks age-old race faultlines
US turns into war zone: Shocking race riot photos
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In countries with authoritarian governments, state-controlled media have been highlighting the chaos and violence of the US demonstrations, in part to undermine American officials’ criticism of their own nations. In China, the protests are being viewed through the prism of US government criticism of China’s crackdown on anti-government protests in Hong Kong. Hu Xijin, the editor of the state-owned Global Times newspaper, tweeted that US officials can now see protests out their own windows: “I want to ask Speaker Pelosi and Secretary Pompeo: Should Beijing support protests in the US like you glorified rioters in Hong Kong?” Hua Chunying, a Chinese Foreign ministry spokeswoman, pointed out America’s racial unrest by tweeting “I can’t breathe,” which Floyd said before his death. In Iran, which has violently put down nationwide demonstrations by killing hundreds, arresting thousands and disrupting internet access to the outside world, state television has repeatedly aired images of the US unrest.
One TV anchor discussed “a horrible scene from New York, where police attacked protesters.” Another state TV message accused US police agencies in Washington of “setting fire to cars and attacking protesters,” without offering any evidence.
Russia accused the United States of “systemic problems in the human rights sphere.”
It denounced Floyd’s death as the latest in a series of police violence cases against African Americans.
“This incident is far from the first in a series of lawless conduct and unjustified violence from U.S. law enforcement,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
“American police commit such high-profile crimes all too often.”
There also have been expressions of solidarity with the demonstrators.
Over the weekend, Lebanese anti-government protesters flooded social media with tweets sympathetic to US protesters, using the hashtag (hash) Americarevolts.
That’s a play on the slogan for Lebanon’s protest movement - Lebanon revolts - which erupted on Oct. 17 last year.
Within 24 hours, the hashtag (hash) Americanrevolts became the No. 1 trending tag in Lebanon.
In another expression of solidarity with American protesters, about 150 people marched through central Jerusalem on Saturday to protest the shooting death by Israeli police of an unarmed, autistic Palestinian man earlier in the day.
Israeli police mistakenly suspected that the man, Iyad Halak, was carrying a weapon.
When he failed to obey orders to stop, officers opened fire.
Originally published as Police chief’s call about fired officers in George Floyd’s death as family take action