The Derek Chauvin Trial

In May of last year, I posted an article about my thoughts on the arrest of George Floyd. I made 5 points in that article: 

1) Among the videos I watched of the arrest, I did not think the cops did anything to cause Floyd's death; 

2) The videos I watched did not show Floyd violently resisting arrest, as I'd previously assumed; 

3) He appeared to be in physical distress during the arrest;

4) He appeared drunk and may already have been in the midst of a medical emergency when cops arrived. I suggested it was probably a heart attack; 

5) There's no apparent explanation for why they pinned him down for so long. 

Since that post, new videos have come out, as well as the coroner's report. As it turns out, Floyd did resist arrest, refusing to remain in the car and dropping on his own to the ground several times. He kept saying he couldn't breathe even before he was pinned to the ground. He was saying it when they were trying to put him in the car. Clearly, if he already was having trouble breathing at that point, then he was, as I suggested, already in the midst of a medical emergency. From the cops' perspective, it would be easy to assume that he was just trying to get out of being arrested. Perhaps that's why they ignored similar pleas once he was on the ground.

It's also noteworthy that Floyd, himself, said he'd rather be held on the ground than held in the squad car. 

The coroner ruled that he died from "cardiopulmonary arrest" secondary to police actions. He found significant blockages in Floyd's heart, but did not rule that it was a heart attack. He also found multiple drug intoxication, including meth, fentanyl, and several different strains of marijuana. Floyd was not drunk. 

There is still no real explanation for why they pinned him down as long as they did. They had called for an ambulance and were awaiting its arrival, but other than that, it's not clear why they kept holding him down, even after he quit moving and talking.

Derek Chauvin - the knee on the neck guy - is currently on trial. There are three different charges the jury is considering - 2nd degree unintentional murder, 3rd degree murder, and 2nd degree manslaughter. He's not charged with 1st degree murder because that would mean he had planned to kill Floyd beforehand. 

2nd degree unintentional murder means you weren't trying to kill someone, but you unintentionally killed someone while committing a felony (think of someone who robs a house, gets confronted by the homeowner, and hits them with a baseball bat; then later the victim dies). 

3rd degree murder means you unintentionally killed someone while doing something inherently dangerous and without regard to other people's safety (think of someone driving 90 down the road who then hits someone and kills them). 

2nd degree manslaughter is the lowest charge and essentially means you were negligent and took an unreasonable risk, resulting in someone's death (think of a doctor who performs a non-emergent surgery despite knowing the patient was unstable, and then the patient dies).  

I'm not sure how they can hope to pin the first charge on him. I guess they are hoping to prove that putting his knee on the man's neck was, in fact, a felonious assault on Floyd. In my opinion, that goes way too far. He clearly wasn't attempting to assault the man ... he was subduing a person who was resisting arrest. 

The 3rd degree charge is more realistic, although it has a phrase in the official language that I think would be problematic for an impartial jury. It says that the act not only has to be "imminently dangerous" and "without regard for human life," but done while also "evidencing a depraved mind." 

I guess "a depraved mind" can mean different things to different people, but to me it implies that you were kind of out of your head when you did it. Like someone in a fight who, in a blind rage, shoves someone and they bang their head on the way down and die. I'm not sure you could convince me beyond a reasonable doubt that Chauvin acted "with a depraved mind" in what he did. I think he probably thought he was subduing a repeat offender who was acting erratic and resisting arrest, all the while being confronted by an increasingly angry group of bystanders. 

The most reasonable charge, for me, is the second degree manslaughter. And that's primarily related to the length of time he leaned on the man's neck. Unless he can take the stand and provide some reasonable, believable, and justifiable rationale for kneeling on him for 9 minutes, including something like 3 minutes after he stopped moving and talking, then he obviously was taking an unreasonable risk, especially in light of Floyd's repeated statements that he was dying and couldn't breathe. 

I think it's highly likely the jury will find him guilty of either the 3rd degree murder charge or the 2nd degree manslaughter charge. If not for the attention given the case, and the protests and everything else, I don't think prosecutors would even have charged him with the second degree murder count. I don't see how they could really hope to convince an impartial jury that Chauvin committed a felonious assault by subduing the man with his knee, regardless of how reckless it might have been.