Minnesota attorney general secured conviction and sentencing of former police officer who murdered George Floyd last year
The Minnesota attorney general who secured the conviction and sentencing of Derek Chauvin said on Sunday Congress must pass stalled policing reform named for George Floyd, the African American man the former officer murdered in May last year.
Related: ‘I have begged for justice’: key moments from the Derek Chauvin sentencing
Continue reading...George Floyd's family members asked for the maximum sentence for Derek Chavin, the white former Minneapolis police officer who was later sentenced to 22 years and six months in prison.
Two months ago, Chauvin was convicted of second-degree murder for pressing his knee against Floyd’s neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds before Floyd died.
'The sudden murder of George has forever traumatized us. You may see us cry, but the full extent of our pain and trauma will never be seen with the naked eye,' said Brandon Williams, Floyd's nephew, to the court
Continue reading...Four members of the Floyd family, including his seven-year-old daughter Gianna, gave statements before the sentencing
Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who murdered George Floyd, has been sentenced to 22 years and six months for second-degree murder, closing one chapter of a case that thrust the issue of race and American policing back into the global spotlight.
Related: Protests erupt in Minneapolis over man fatally shot by deputies
Continue reading...Judge Peter Cahill has sentenced Derek Chauvin, the white former police officer who knelt on George Floyd's neck until he died, to 22 and half years in prison.
The judge acknowledged 'the deep and tremendous pain' felt by the Floyd family and others, but he said the sentence was not based on public opinion
Continue reading...Video footage challenges official claims that the cause of death was unrelated to man’s arrest
Video footage of a police officer kneeling on the neck of a Romany man who later died in an ambulance is being shared among Czechs on social media, leading many to compare his treatment to that of George Floyd.
The video, shot on 19 June, shows three police officers in Teplice, a town in the north of the Czech Republic, detaining a Romany man on the floor. As one officer holds the man’s feet, another appears to kneel on his neck, and a third tries to handcuff him. Voices of several Roma bystanders are heard in the video.
Continue reading...Workers began removing artwork and barricades from George Floyd Square, the memorial space constructed at the south Minneapolis intersection where George Floyd was murdered by a white police officer.
Barricades were being taken down to allow the intersection to be reopened to traffic, the city confirmed, but there were small demonstrations by community activists and local residents that opposed the reopening of the intersection at Chicago Avenue and 38th Street.
The space, which became a de facto autonomous zone, features memorials, community art, sculptures and often hosts performances and protests
Continue reading...A sombre week as BBC presenters pondered war reporting ethics, George Floyd’s death, and a decade of conflict in Syria
Sunday Feature: Regarding the Pain of Others (BBC Radio 3) | BBC Sounds
1Xtra Talks With Richie Brave (BBC 1Xtra) | BBC Sounds
Assignment (BBC World Service) | BBC Sounds
Today, on Radio 3’s Sunday Feature, the vastly experienced journalist Allan Little considers Susan Sontag’s 2003 essay Regarding the Pain of Others. In the essay, Sontag wonders about the ethics of war journalism, particularly photography. Do pictures of the horrors of war engage the viewer or make us turn away?
Continue reading...Thousands of people have marked the first anniversary of George Floyd's death with marches and vigils across the US. Large crowds gathered in New York and Los Angeles while in Minneapolis, the city Floyd died in, he was honoured with a moment's silence. Mourners also gathered later at Minneapolis's George Floyd Memorial Square for a candlelight vigil
An Associated Press journalist had to duck for cover during a report from George Floyd Memorial Square in Minneapolis as gunshots rang out nearby. Philip Crowther was covering the first anniversary of George Floyd’s death from the intersection where Floyd died and reported hearing about 30 gunshots from two blocks away. Local authorities later reported one person was treated for a non life-threatening gunshot wound. Marches and vigils were held across the US to mark one year since George Floyd’s death
Continue reading...Residents gathered across the city to honor Floyd and other victims of police violence, and vowed to hold officers accountable
In downtown Minneapolis, the city that was plagued with tension during the Derek Chauvin murder trial last month, a celebration of George Floyd’s life was held less than a mile from where the white former Minneapolis officer was convicted of all three counts of his murder.
The event, organized by the George Floyd Memorial Foundation, was filled with shrieks from children as they leapt in bouncy houses while others filled the air with bubbles. The smells from a dozen food trucks penetrated the space as people danced and basked in the sun.
Continue reading...Floyd’s brother describes Biden as a ‘genuine guy’ but urged him to pass a law ‘to protect people of color’ at White House meeting
“Say his name,” said seven-year-old Gianna Floyd. In bright sunshine outside the west wing of the White House, family members and lawyers raised their fists and said her father’s name in chorus: “George Floyd!”
They were marking exactly one year since the police murder of Floyd, an African American man, in Minneapolis shook America with months of nationwide protests against racial injustice and demands for police reform.
Continue reading...The family of George Floyd spoke to reporters after meeting Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on Tuesday to commemorate the anniversary of his murder. They addressed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which they called for Congress to pass. Philonise Floyd said: ‘If you can make federal laws to protect the [national] bird, which is the bald eagle, you can make federal laws to protect people of colour’
At least 15 states are trying to ban schools from teaching critical race theory and the 1619 Project. The reactionary movement stretches back to the 1920s and the KKK
On 25 May 2020, a man died after a “medical incident during police interaction” in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The man was suspected of forgery and “believed to be in his 40s”. He “physically resisted officers” and, after being handcuffed, “appeared to be suffering medical distress”. He was taken to the hospital “where he died a short time later”.
It is not difficult to imagine a version of reality where this, the first police account of George Floyd’s brutal death beneath the knee of an implacable police officer, remained the official narrative of what took place in Minneapolis one year ago. That version of reality unfolds every day. Police lies are accepted and endorsed by the press; press accounts are accepted and believed by the public.
Continue reading...We would like to hear from people who plan to attend a vigil to commemorate the first anniversary of the murder of George Floyd
Vigils are to be held across the UK to mark the one-year anniversary of the murder of George Floyd, who died in Minneapolis, Minnesota on 25 May last year after a white police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes.
His death sparked global outcry and was the catalyst for widespread anti-racist protests across the world last summer. Thousands marched in towns and cities in the UK under the banner of Black Lives Matter while others, unable to take part in person due to the pandemic, joined in via social media.
Continue reading...Program starts with march led by the Rev Al Sharpton and Benjamin Crump to mark the anniversary of black man’s murder
Members of George Floyd’s family, and others who lost loved ones to police encounters, have joined crowds in Minneapolis for a march that was one of several events planned nationwide to mark the one-year anniversary of Floyd’s death.
Hundreds of people gathered on Sunday for the rally in front of the courthouse in downtown Minneapolis where a month ago former policeman Derek Chauvin was found guilty of murdering the black man by kneeling on his neck.
Continue reading...A year ago, Christopher Martin took an allegedly counterfeit bill. The police were called, and shortly after, Floyd would be dead
Christopher Martin lived above a bricked grocery store in south Minneapolis, with a maroon awning and bold red signage that reads Cup Foods. So when a cashier’s position came up last year, he took it without thinking.
He quickly learned the regulars’ orders by heart, their specific tobacco preferences, their favored snacks. The job was more than just a paycheck. “A family, community base,” he remembered. “A lot of jokes and laughs.”
Continue reading...The killing of Floyd by a white officer reflected a common history of violence against Black people that united protesters in a renewed global movement
George Floyd’s murder felt like everything was the same and nothing was the same, said Miski Noor, an activist in Minneapolis, where Floyd was killed by a white police officer a year ago on 25 May.
“How many times have we seen Black death go viral?” asked Noor, the co-founder of Black Visions, which advocates for abolition, an approach to public safety that does not involve the police.
Continue reading...The bestselling author on reimagining Hillary Clinton’s life, what novelists have learned from Covid and the mood in her home town, Minneapolis, since the murder of George Floyd
Curtis Sittenfeld, 45, is the author of two short story collections and six novels, including Prep, her 2005 debut about a teenage girl at boarding school, and American Wife, narrated by a White House first lady, based on Laura Bush. Both books were bestsellers longlisted for the Orange prize (now the Women’s prize for fiction). Her latest novel, Rodham, out in paperback next month, imagines how Hillary Clinton’s political career might have looked had she not married Bill. Sittenfeld, who was born in Ohio and studied at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, spoke to me on Zoom from Minneapolis, where she has lived since 2018.
What led you to write a counterfactual novel about Hillary Clinton?
Early in 2016, Esquire asked if I’d like to write a short story from Hillary’s perspective as she accepted the Democratic presidential nomination. It was an interesting exercise, but I don’t think I’d have gone on to write Rodham had Trump not won the 2016 election. I was devastated. I found myself thinking about schoolchildren who had known Hillary was running for president. In many cases, they literally didn’t know Bill Clinton existed or that she’d been first lady - they knew her as a politician. I thought, what if adults also didn’t see Hillary and Bill as connected? Would the 2016 election have turned out differently?
A federal grand jury has indicted the four former Minneapolis police officers involved in George Floyd’s arrest and murder, accusing them of violating the Black man’s constitutional rights as he was restrained face-down on the pavement and gasping for air, according to indictments unsealed on Friday.
The three-count indictment on civil rights charges names Derek Chauvin, Thomas Lane, J Kueng and Tou Thao.
Continue reading...A New Jersey high school teacher was suspended with pay for making profanity-laced comments to students about George Floyd.
Related: Teargas, flash-bangs: the devastating toll of police tactics on Minnesota children
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