Trial for ex-officers charged with abetting Floyd murder delayed until 2022
13 May 2021
The trial for three former Minneapolis police officers charged by state prosecutors with aiding and abetting the murder of George Floyd has been moved to March 7, 2022, AP reports.
Why it matters: Hennepin County Judge Peter Cahill said he wanted to move the date to accommodate a new federal case against the officers and Derek Chauvin, who has already been convicted on state charges for Floyd's murder.
- Chauvin, Thomas Lane, J.A. Kueng and Tou Thao were indicted by a federal grand jury last week for civil rights violations related to Floyd's death.
- Cahill also said he felt the need to delay the three officers' trial due to the recency of Chauvin's trial, which garnered national attention for weeks leading up to his conviction on April 20.
Between the lines: Earlier this week, Cahill determined the participation of the three officers' in Floyd's arrest to be an aggravating factor in weighing whether to side with state prosecutors who are seeking a more severe sentence against Chauvin.
- Cahill found that the crime was committed "as a group with the active participation of at least three" other officers.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.