First there was the transcript. I wrote about that on 11 July (see here). Now we have the video. Floyd was complaining of not being able to breath at least five minutes before the police were forced by Floyd to put him on the ground. The transcript I posted on the 11th shows clear evidence that George Floyd was complaining of not being able to breath. This video provides the visual proof. George Floyd was not killed by police. He was suffering respiratory distress caused by a Fentanyl overdose. His inability to breath had nothing to do with the neck restraint applied by the Minneapolis police.
Now we know that the entire premise of the Black Lives Matter riots was based on a false claim of police abuse. Derek Chauvin did not murder George Floyd. George Floyd, a criminal and drug addict, killed himself by ingesting a drug that Doctors use to shutdown a patient’s respiratory system.
As I noted on July 11th, the transcript exonerates the police. This is why the Minnesota Attorney General tried to keep the public from seeing the video evidence for themselves.
I am re-posting the transcript so that you can compare it with the video. The video starts with two Minneapolis Police officers approaching Floyd’s vehicle from the driver’s side. One of the officers has his pistol drawn and pointed in Floyd’s direction. However, per standard practice, his finger is not, I REPEAT NOT, on the trigger. If the finger is not on the trigger the gun will not fire itself.
Also worth noting that the police were not physically aggressive with Floyd. They did not punch him or jerk him around. Floyd, in his drugged state, was not cooperative. It is a shame that the officers who detained Floyd lacked clairvoyance or the ability to read Floyd’s mind or mentally test the chemical content of his blood. That kind of knowledge might have given them an early clue that Floyd was a dead man walking because of the toxic brew of illegal drugs he had shoved into his system.
Here’s the link to the full transcript.
The two officers (Kueng and Thomas Lane) go outside and begin the investigation by trying to get George Floyd out of his car:
Floyd was not cooperative. He was disoriented and not acting rationally. Floyd was accompanied by another black man. In contrast to Floyd, the other gentleman followed police instructions:
On page 12 of the transcript we get the first evidence that Floyd is high on something and is “foaming” at the mouth. Officer Kueng is very concerned about Floyd’s erratic behavior:
Floyd’s erratic behavior escalates as Officer Kueng and Lane try to put him in the police car:
The transcript and the video are damning for all arm chair prosecutors who jumped to the unwarranted and unsupported claim that the police killed George Floyd. The did not. tFloyd’s respiratory crisis was caused by the Fentanyl he had ingested before the police showed up on the scene. That evidence also is reflected in the autopsy report. Those who have rushed to judgment in condemning the Minneapolis Police Department will have to do some major mea culpas.
Larry,
“Hooping” more commonly, and in this context clearly, playing basketball.
Larry:
Do you really think the truth matters ?
I don’t think Chauvin will be exonerated, but there is no question advocates of the racist police brutality narrative are ignoring facts.
The conclusion of the private autopsy requested by the family was wrong. They didn’t know the results of the toxicology report. One of the experts hired by the family, who kept making television appearances (including on Hannity), didn’t even look at the body. To the best of my knowledge, this man only saw the video and ruled it a homicide on that basis alone. Another expert hired by the family saw the body, but again she didn’t see the toxicology report. The lawyer for the family, Ben Crump, is an ass for calling the toxicology report a red herring.
The fact is when the store clerks called the cops, they said Floyd appeared drunk. He was clearly inebriated or intoxicated. The fact he handed off an obviously fake $20 bill suggests he wasn’t all there. There is no denying the toxicology report which does prove he was intoxicated. And the police were right to apprehend him. This Floyd was inebriated or intoxicated while sitting behind the wheel of a car, so he clearly represented a danger if he began to drive.
With all that being said, despite the fact he had trouble breathing beforehand doesn’t exclude that the manner he was being detained had contributed to his death. The second autopsy (I’m not talking the private one, but the official second autopsy) officially did rule his death a homicide because the manner he was held down was deemed a contributing factor in his death.
In my personal opinion, I think there is a case to be made that Chauvin did recognize Floyd and deliberately kept Floyd on his stomach, with his face pointed downward, so that Floyd wouldn’t recognize Chauvin. Maybe Chauvin was also trying to pass Floyd out or induce Floyd to vomit something he may have swallowed to hide from the police, who knows, but the manner Floyd was held down, even if it is considered accepted albeit rare procedure, will not hold in front of a jury. Procedures aside, there has to be common sense.
fakebot
A conviction will be appealed on the basis of a willful disregard of evidence, and then the situation will get interesting.
fakebot:
There is no question Chauvin’s actions were excessive and he should be disciplined for that. However, unless his actions were the primary cause of death it is not murder. It is all a moot point though. Everyone on that jury knows if they vote to acquit their life and livelihood will be at risk as well as those of their close family members. Hopefully there will be at least one courageous juror with integrity but I doubt it.
Mark Logan,
Here is the top definition of this slang term at Urban Dictionary:
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Hooping
So not in this context os it a reference to playing basketball. And do you really think it likely that this overweight guy with circulatory problems, a long time drug user, and by his own claim just coming off of a dose of WuFlu was recreating himself playing basketball earlier on?
This strains credulity.
If the police officers are acquitted in a state trial, they will be found guilty in a federal civil rights trial. These four officers are going to spend years in prison, as will the officer in Atlanta. The politicians, POTUS included, will be happy to ensure this outcome.
It would be better if the officers were turned over to the mob, shot to death, and then set afire. The mob can drag their charred remains through the street, chanting slogans, and then hang their remains from a bridge. There’s a great bridge on the outskirts of Fallujah that served this purpose in the past.
Things are what they are, not what they should be.
JM Gavin
Mark Logan,
According to a poster in another blog comment section, “hooping” can also refer to ingesting drugs by means of an enema, actually an effective way to absorb them into the body. Millions of AIDS sufferers (and sufferers from other STDs) can’t be wrong! This area is a weak link in the body’s defenses against intruders, whether viral, bacterial, or chemical. Besides, ingestion via enema avoids problems such as visible track marks (awkward to explain to LEOs or parole officers), and being found in possession of “works”, i.e., syringes, spoons for “cooking” with a lighter, or hydrating the drugs into an injectable form.
As a long term convict, I am sure George was quite familiar with secreting items in his rectum, so an enema would be child’s play.
fakebot,
“There is no question Chauvin’s actions were excessive?” His actions appear to be consistent with his training and MPD policy, and yet you’ve figured out that the actions were excessive?
JM Gavin
Excellent.
Every elected official who claimed the police killed Floyd and every media report that claimed the police killed Floyd, and everyone who republished this claim need to be sued- slander per se, false accusation of a crime.
I assume there will be no problem claiming damages, and even punitive damages due to willful intent to defame, by all the wrongly accused police officers.
This lynching of the police officers was media defamation of the Covington Catholic Kids…… on steroids.
By charging him with murder and not manslaughter, the DA was intentionally putting Chauvin into a good position to get off. I’m no BLM supporter, but watch the tape and tell me that Chauvin is not guilty of manslaughter.
fakebot, “homicide” means a person died, and that it did not initially appear to be a suicide. However OD by drugs could be called a suicide. We also have the cruel phenomenon of “suicide by cop” where someone sets up a scenario to die at the hands of a police officer, or a passing train, or motor vehicle.
You are reading way more into this incident than supported by the facts in evidence. Why is that? Or even supported by the facts in evidence when the toxicology report first came out. It was not clear from that point forward how in fact Floyd died.
Now that the embers have died down, vicious political lines drawn, the Nation convulsed, the additional bodies counted, and the damages assessed to the point the Minnesota Gov is now begging for a federal bailout, it is a strange time to finally officially release this contemporaneous and potentially exculpatory evidence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSr0YJm34CU
The take from the CBC TV reporters is G. Floyd said he couldn’t breathe many times with the implication the officers deliberately ignored it.
Larry,
I mostly agree. First, the hold that Cauvin used was, as you have noted, is approved by department policy. It would have been used to keep both Floyd and the cops safe. It might look terrible to the untrained eye and present as the ultimate archetype in a paranoid ink blot test, but it is a safe and effective means of controlling someone when used properly. I demonstrated to some friends recently by having my wife (125 pounds +/-) apply the hold to me (200 + pounds, mostly muscle). I could not get up or thrash too much. I was a controlled, yet unharmed. The assumption has been from the beginning that Chauvin was applying his total weight to Floyd’s neck. With one knee on the ground, the amount of pressure applied by the other knee, to the neck, can be completely regulated and need not be excessive. Anyone can verify this by simply trying it instead of repeating what they have been told by the media. If you are worried about hurting a partner, try it on an inanimate object. Everyone is so into “science”, but then unwilling to test a basic hypothesis before virtue signaling away.
Where I think Chauvin screwed up is in not giving Floyd CPR, etc once he stopped breathing. However, that is not murder. The excessive charges are a set up for subsequent riots; probably worse than the first round, when Chauvin is acquitted at trial or on appeal. Maybe that is intentional.
Terence Gore,
The problem is that people resisting arrest often say things like, “I can’t breath”. Often enough that cops see it as crying wolf. Besides, what were the cops supposed to do with someone who is thrashing and resisting arrest and saying he can’t breath? Let him thrash and hurst himself and/or cops? All they could do was control Floyd for safety while waiting on the EMTs.
Based on the comments ahead of me, there will be no resolution of this matter that is not democratic – in other words, a compromise both sides hate.
The ‘racism’ narrative never did fit; their previous work history together is not spoken of at any length; their former employer and the background of that establishment is also very interesting.
Multi-racial myself, this entire BLM things is fueled more by wealth or opportunity disparity than anything else. It’s a game many of us just refuse to play any longer, but nobody can fix stupid – it has to fix itself.
Eric
Understood, I was trying to make the point MSM is not taking a deeper look the is at the issue.
“Some drugs produce undesirable effects with an oral application. With rectal administration, a person who typically feels nauseous from taking a certain substance orally may be able to avoid that feeling. A person may also want to experience the “high” more quickly in certain situations. For example, a person may seek social competence and emotional awareness associated with MDMA when at social gatherings, and may want to produce the effects of it more quickly than usual. Or a person who wants the relaxed and calm feelings associated with alcohol may want to orally administer it to have the effects of it while not emitting the smell on his breath.
This is a trend becoming more and more popular with teens as a way to get the desired effects while hiding (at least for a while) the evidence of abuse. Whatever the reason a person may rectally abuse substances, there are blatant side effects ranging from mild to severe.”
https://www.rehabcenter.net/dangers-rectally-administering-drugs/
I would think the average jury would find Pluggin/hooping a very risky behavior
Floyd was inebriated from his drug ingestion and once apprehended needed to be restrained due to his impairment. Once on the ground, his suggestion, Chauvin applied a restraint to Floyd’s scapula and repeatedly applied pressure in a throttling manner. Was it the neck and not the scapula, that’s in the eye of the viewer and camera angle. Never believe what you think you see as there always Is another angle. Oh, yes he did slip it to the neck but for how long time will tell.
He applied the restraint way to long, he did not allow the body to be turned as suggested and reacted poorly to the growing crowd. A professional law enforcement trainer of restraint holds could answer most questions and will in court but with the quick condemnation by law enforcement agencies answers most questions. Homicide 1st or 2nd degree only in Minneapolis.
Congratulations to Keith Ellison, former congressman, former vice chair of the DNC, and current Attorney General of Minnesota. Suppressing this evidence was essential in ensuring the myth of George Floyd was spread around the world before even a flicker of fact emerged.
“We found a weed pipe on him, there might be something else with it. Might be like, PCP or something.”
Tomas Lane, Minneapolis PD. That’s the “systemicly racist” police department in that city run by the Democratic Farm Labor party, which, like the Attorney General’s office of the State of Minneapolis, has been in charge for half a century or more.
Congratulations Democrats. You have shown the world that you believe that individual idenity must be rejected in favor of group identity, guilt for things done in the past is inheritable, and only one group has lives that matter. History must be replaced with the new reality, the Democratic party’s belief that America was founded on racism, it’s institutions, codes of law, and culture must all be swept asside to be replaced with the ideals of the “democratic socialist” wing of the party.
Chaz, Chop and CNN couldn’t frame a better narrative to run for election on in 2020. Better get some Covid cover stories going lest people start asking why men and women are fined or arrested for trying to open barber shops, walk without a face burka in public, or otherwise excercise freedoms yet looters, arsonists, and destroyers of public monuments walk free; along with tens of thousands of criminals who were released from prison. Certainly no one wants to know why FISA abuse has gone unpunished, why DOJ lawyers can make up evidence, withhold other material from defendants – repeatedly, yet none are arrested or otherwise held to account. We certainly don’t want to know what Joe Biden and his boss were doing those 8 years they were in office; or all the other years Joe spent in the House and Senate.
Fentanyl and other opioids do NOT cause respiratory distress or shortness of breath. They generally depress all activity of the brain and especially the area that control respiration. In a large enough dose you first pass out and then stop breathing. That is why most opiate overdoses are simply found dead. A guy foaming at the mouth, agitated and wanting to lie down is sick, and should be treated as such. He should not be cuffed with his hands behind his back (also a stress position which impedes the motion of the chest and hence effective breathing), made to lie prone (also an impediment to ability to breathe) with a knee on the back of the neck which will compress the upper airway. This guy may have been a SOB and a MOFO but did not deserve this for any reason let alone passing a bad $20 bill. It was not murder in the first, but some blame needs to be allocated.
Out of the way, it’s a busy day
I’ve got things on my mind
For want of the price of tea and a slice
The old man died
“Us and Them”, Pink Floyd
First, let me explain that I am a retired Cardiologist (ABIM Certified in both Internal Medicine and Cardiology). As such, have on thousands of occasions helped in the ER’s when people come in on drugs….and I have seen the panic in their eyes and the physiologic changes that occur (severe hypertension, Adrenalin release, heart attacks, strokes).
When I read the available reports from Floyd’s autopsy I was struck by the fact this fellow had ingested a large quantity of dangerous drugs; combinations of stimulants and opioids (fentanyl…one of the most dangerous drugs on the street…we even have to be careful with it in the hospital). He wasn’t able to react appropriately to the circumstances and those officers aren’t doctors. The officers were trapped. The only decision they could make was to control the subject and try to prevent him from injuring himself or them…or someone else. From what I read in the Minneapolis PD manual the use of the neck restraint (as they used it) was trained and approved.
Factually, this probably didn’t cause an injury. I think the defense will probably utilize this; perhaps they will get a ‘slap on the hands’…but they did what they were trained to do with a large, strong, resisting subject. I am worried that it will result in a ‘ Rodney King’ response with riots and destruction. I don’t see a good ‘end’ here.
Charlie Wilson
I agree.
I am reminded of a piece by Art Buchwald, in which, he quoted the response of a governor of Illinois to a prison riot: ” we need a better class of prisoners.”
I suppose we need a healthier and more responsible-acting class of miscreants, who could endure incidents of police brutality and not inconviently dying and besmirching the sterling reputation of the police – causing riots among the feeble-minded population.
Charlie Wilson, why the intentional misinformation campaign when we all have search engines at our fingertips?
“……..According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, this powerful drug is 100 times more potent than morphine and 50 times more potent than heroin. Along with targeting the opioid receptors in the brain that control pain, the opioid receptors that control breathing and heart rate are also affected. This can lead an individual to stop breathing all together if too much Fentanyl is taken………
EMT was called, he was being symptomatically treated. He did not die because of a bad $20 bill. He died because from the moment he woke up that day he made one fatal decision after another, all bad. Including buying cigarette with his bad $20 bill, when he claimed on tape he had “post-covid breathing” problems. He set his own fate in motion.
Might want to wait for the start of the woke NFL season before doing any more Monday morning quarterbacking.
CHF is associated with cardiomegaly which is associated with SOB
(shortness of breadth)
From the autopsy
A. Arteriosclerotic heart disease, multifocal, severe
B. Hypertensive heart disease
1. Cardiomegaly (540 g) with mild biventricular
dilatation
2. Clinical history of hypertension
1. Fentanyl 11 ng/mL
2. Norfentanyl 5.6 ng/mL
3. 4-ANPP 0.65 ng/mL
4. Methamphetamine 19 ng/mL
5. 11-Hydroxy Delta-9 THC 1.2 ng/mL;
Delta-9 Carboxy THC 42 ng/mL; Delta-9 THC 2.9 ng/mL
6. Cotinine positive
7. Caffeine positive”
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2020/07/08/the-medical-examiners-report-of-george-floyds-death/
Methamphetamine most often causes a general feeling of wellness (euphoria) that is most often called a “rush.” Other symptoms are increased heart rate, increased blood pressure, and large, wide pupils.
If you take a large amount of the drug, you will be at higher risk for more dangerous side effects, including:
Agitation
Chest pain
Coma or unresponsiveness (in extreme cases)
Heart attack
Irregular or stopped heartbeat
Difficulty breathing
Very high body temperature
Kidney damage and possibly kidney failure
Paranoia
Seizures
Severe stomach pain
Stroke
Long-term use of methamphetamine can lead to significant psychological problems, including:
Delusional behavior
Extreme paranoia
Major mood swings
Insomnia (severe inability to sleep)
Other symptoms may include:
Missing and rotted teeth (called “meth mouth”)
Repeated infections
Severe weight loss
Skin sores (abscesses or boils)
The length of time methamphetamines stay active can be much longer than for cocaine and other stimulants. Some paranoid delusions can last for 15 hours.”
https://www.mountsinai.org/health-library/poison/methamphetamine-overdose
“Common signs of opiate or stimulant overdose are:
foaming at the mouth or a foam cone
loss of consciousness
seizures
difficulty or stopped breathing
Overdose causes foaming at the mouth because organs like the heart and lungs can’t function properly. Slowed heart or lung movements causes fluids to gather in the lungs, which can mix with carbon dioxide and come out of the mouth like a foam.”
https://www.healthline.com/health/foaming-at-the-mouth#causes
Eric Newhill,
“The excessive charges are a set up for subsequent riots; probably worse than the first round, when Chauvin is acquitted at trial or on appeal. Maybe that is intentional.”
I thought this the moment I heard the charges were bumped up from 3rd to 2nd degree murder. IMHO, this was also unquestionably a prime motive for the Atlanta DA to rush to charge that officer with felony 1st degree murder. I don’t know how a prosecutor could prove to an impartial jury that this was first degree, pre-meditated murder, given the indisputable facts of the case.
I firmly believe both of these cases have been deliberately set up to fail in prosecution in order to effect a truly cataclysmic round of domestic unrest upon the results of the trials. The need the system to fail in order to prove their contention that it is inherently racist. These people want power at all costs. They do not care one bit about the citizenry of their municipalities who undoubtedly will suffer mightily once these trials play out to acquittal or at best a hung jury.
The tape reveals most importantly the high degree of professionalism of the police officers; and a window into what they are asked to go up against every day. Sympathies accrue to the police officers, who stayed calm and neutral, and compassionately carried out their assigned duties.
There is no other conclusion that can be reached, after listening these presented contemporaneous facts. When do we get the partisan howls the tapes were fake or doctored?
Will another OJ-type jury find the police officers guilty? It could happen. You could read the body language of the OJ jury from first prosecution witness forward – OJ was going to get off. Preserving our system of checks and balances as best we can against the mob, becomes a sacred task.
Jersey,
Trust me on this. Playing basketball is what he meant and what the officers at the scene thought he meant. If they had thought he was referring to smuggling drugs the officers would have asked him straight away what kind of drugs, as they would have had an unsolicited admission of an illegal act.
Eric, AK, Deap:
The thought these police officers will be acquitted is false hope. As I said earlier, any juror who votes to acquit is literally putting his life and livelihood on the line. Perhaps a retiree with courage and integrity will be on the jury and do the right thing, resulting in a hung jury. If this causes more extreme rioting, so be it.
For Charlie Wilson,
Brown sugar had a sweet behind.
A little bit loose was the old caboose,
But the downlow crew thought it was fine,
And better than his nose for snorting a line.
He’d squeeze on the lube, slide in the tube,
Then give forth a tremendous shout!
I am hoopin’ it up now and I going to cruise,
So bring me out my old dancing shoes!
I done gone and lit off the fuze!
When he count to a hundred and three,
He could outrun the Robert E. Lee!
Well said, Mr. Newell. Perfect setup for later chaos. I also wondered how an autopsy that doesn’t mention homicide as cause of death can be used to bring murder charges of any sort. Can a prosecutor file murder charges without an ME finding of homicide?
is Chauvin still being held in jail? Just terrible that he has been vilified by politicians ranging from Trump to BLM advocates.
I truly believe he overdosed. He admitted to having previously having drugs in his rectum. His own words lend credence to having drugs in his rectum and NOT playing basketball. He was impaired and acting irrationally. Basketball doesn’t cause that. Drugs do. Chauvin is partially guilty but will likely be found guilty simply because he had multiple previous negative encounters with Floyd at their previous security job.
As for officer keung and Lane. Lane continuously advocated to his SUPERVISING officer for Floyd to be rolled over, could be having delirium, and him not breathing, he showed intent to help Floyd all throughout the video(3 times I believe) also it was keung and Lane’s FOURTH day on patrol and their supervising officer was chauvin. Lane was simply holding his feet while advocating to his supervisor to move Floyd to help him breathe. Yet again I say it was their 4th day on patrol. They knew no better than to listen to their supervising officer. Do I believe they can find a jury who is truly unbiased and who are willing to accept the plain and simple facts, well I doubt that. They 1000% cannot get a fair trial in Minneapolis. They definitely need a change of venue. As far as the federal crimes, I believe Chauvin and Tao will be convicted but there is no negative evidence against kueng or lane. In fact there is multiple pieces of EXCULPATORY evidence that clears their name. Do the police need to change. Absolutely. Were the two cops who were on their 4th day of patrol just beginning their careers deserve to be convicted because of a false narrative… Absolutely not
God bless you all
Does anyone else find it inconsistent that George Floyd claimed he suffered from claustrophobia as a reason not to be placed in the police car, yet he was sitting in a car when the police first approached him?
Since Chauvin and his wife screwed state, local and Federal governments out of $100K in taxes. Both failed to report income for over 10 years. What’s really stupid was she was got a 1099 for all the income. I hope they throw the book at both of them. Steal $100k and nothing happens until you accidentally kill a their who tried to pass a bad $20. What a country…
The fact he handed off an obviously fake $20 bill suggests he wasn’t all there. There is no denying the toxicology report which does prove he was intoxicated.
Posted by: fakebot | 11 July 2020 at 05:40 PM
Interesting. You feel he could be either the counterfeiter or somehow connected with one of those? But since intoxicated he wasn’t able anymore to keep his fake and his non-fake money apart?
In my personal opinion, I think there is a case to be made that Chauvin did recognize Floyd and deliberately kept Floyd on his stomach, with his face pointed downward, so that Floyd wouldn’t recognize Chauvin. Maybe Chauvin was also trying to pass Floyd out or induce Floyd to vomit something he may have swallowed to hide from the police, who knows, but the manner Floyd was held down, even if it is considered accepted albeit rare procedure, will not hold in front of a jury. Procedures aside, there has to be common sense.
Posted by: fakebot | 11 July 2020 at 05:40 PM
On top of all you feel that Chauvin may have known, interesting theory*, that Floyd additionally may have dealt drugs and Chauvin knew that?
* he learned while they worked together …? Or via his police work?
That might have worked as an argument if we hadn’t all seen the video of a police officer kneeling on his neck for 9 minutes.
Also even if your story is true, does that mean there is no police brutality in the USA?
akaPatience,
The professional low level street criminal/drug addict is almost always a verbal machine gun spraying BS at a high cyclic rate. Taking any of it seriously is a fool’s errand. That’s one reason I’m sympathetic to the cops not paying attention to “I can’t breath”. If they had a nickel for every time they heard that and similar lines, they’d be retired already.
Out in California, where they refuse to publicize this police cam video, they remain convinced young rookie cops, fueled by toxic testosterone levels, go out joy riding just to kill black men for sport and good laughs.
Just the opposite of what this video demonstrates- very cool and patient professionalism and great restraint under the aggravated non-cooperation circumstance – they had ridden in this rodeo before – yet any comments to the contrary defending these police officer on local blogs get censored. Yes, we do have two Americas. One for the facts; the other for the narrative. But this is the home of Tinsel Town.
Hollywood also gives a cold shoulder to Larry Elder’s amazing documentary “Uncle Tom”. Meanwhile city residents must drive by the huge downtown wall mural of St George Floyd, strewn with memorial flowers, immortalizing his last words ‘I can’t breathe”. In a town where you cannot go to church, but 3000 can crowd into a BLM rally and march – where the protest leaders demanded the ring of police and mayor ..take a knee.
Take a hike, BLM until you can get your facts straight.
james
yes, “a contributing factor”” but if he had not been full of fentanyl and booze he probable would not have died. You think the police forced him to dope himself up?
James Doleman
Sanctimonious Bullshit. You live in Scotland? The police are never brutal there? The truth about human nature is that given authority over others most are inclined to abuse that authority.
Tom
You know very well that he was arrested for resisting arrest.
James,
I don’t think this was a case of police brutality, just poor training. Want to see police brutality? Google “Rodney King”. This was very different. I see no evidence of rage from anyone there. He’s calmly kneeling with a hand in his pocket. He didn’t know he was killing the guy. He was training two new cops and people were watching. Bet the farm.
I’ll go on to predict that won’t get him off the hook. Every LE outfit in the nation instantly agreed that kneeling on a guy’s neck for nearly nine minutes in that situation was wrong, wrong, WRONG. Even the dispatcher called it in and it was questioned by one of the cops on the scene at the time. IMO this was negligent homicide. Murder two, not one.
Mark Logan & James,
I’m going to encourage you, again, to test the “neck leaning” technique. If you’re afraid of hurting a partner, use a pillow or something similar. Have one knee on the ground and one across the pillow. See if you are necessarily apply fatal pressure (hint; not at all).
Of course other LE departments across the country condemned the technique. That’s merely a political decision.
9 minutes of excessive pressure should have left bruising on Floyd’s neck. I don’t think such a thing was noted.
autopsy and other evidence reasonable people can disagree, but with certain historical narratives people just accept the official tale no matter how scant the evidence or ridiculous the claims.
Like Al Capone, looks like the Chauvin will go down for taxes; not toxic policing. But for the self-ingested drug overdoses and then lying to the police officer he was clean, Floyd may well have been alive today – to kill himself some other way.
Larry Johnson
One must never take the side of the Strong against the Weak; in my opinion.
James,
The neck restraint applied by the three officers was a fully approved technique that had been authorized and taught at the Police Academy in Minneapolis since April 2012. You should actually do some research before opining on something that exposes your lack of knowledge. Moreover, the visual looks bad but is not depressing the carotid artery nor is it obstructing the windpipe. George Floyd was a stupid junky. Simple.
Babak,
And who might the “strong” be in this case?
The police.
Contrasting interpretation of the same video by Martin Gould for DailyMail
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/55424.htm
“The terror on George Floyd’s face as a rookie cop points a gun at his head while he sits in his car can be seen today for the first time . . . ”
There follows a narration of the dialogue between Floyd and officers that is cast as police harassing Floyd while Floyd tries out various protestations — as E Newhill wrote, “a verbal machine gun spraying BS at a high cyclic rate.”
But DailyMail concedes this: “While still in the car, Floyd says for the first time the line that has become synonymous with his death. ‘I can’t breathe.’ Shortly afterwards Chauvin and Thao arrive on the scene.”
I wonder if reporter Gould realizes the import of that chronology.
Babak,
In Minneapolis that would be the Democratic Party leadership, since they were in charge when a police officer – not the entire department – one now in prison, killed Justine Diamond, and it is still the Democratic party leaderhsip in charge of Minneapolis. The nationwide riots are not seeking removing the Democratic Party leadership that allowed this type of policing.
Artemesia
African-Americans have the gift of gab, the Irish being a distant second.
No one in America can match the oratory of an African-American preacher but another such.
“… a verbal machine gun…” – only to those who are unaware or un-gifted in gab.
And I ask myself: “Was a fake 20-dollar bill worth all of this and that which followed?”
james
This is not a court of law, Canadian or US. This is a court of reason based on evidence.
It would be interesting to know if George Floyd had ever overdosed in the past. I presume, maybe wrongly though, there are some sort of records kept when NARCAN is administered. Granted, records may not include the addicts’ names. A significant percentage of fire/EMT runs in the region where I live are for drug overdoses, and I’ve read news reports that occasionally there are addicts who overdose more than once in a single day.
George Floyd had nearly 4X the amount of fentanyl in his system that’s been known to cause death, not counting all of the other toxic substances the autopsy revealed. In a fair trial that alone would surely be a mitigating factor.
It appears to me that Mr. Floyd was almost, if not in fact, a “dead man walking” at the time the police wee called in over a fake $20 bill.
A whole lot of turmoil in our country could have been prevented if the police had not done the jobs they were trained and paid to do and instead had simply gone in to give the clerk a valid $20 bill and allowed Floyd to go into “that good night” (a reference to the famous poem by Dylan thomas). Floyd seems to have tried as much as possible, with or without conscious intent, to commit suicide.
I know that it is “illegal” to make such an attempt; however, think of how much trouble our country has endured because the police tried to do fulfill their dutues.
People intent on killing themselves–whether they are fully cognizant or not that they are subconsciously or consciously trying to do that–are perhaps the most dangerous people for the police to deal with. If things go wrong in an encounter with such a person, the police get all the blame and the person who is the cause of the trouble gets the sympathy.
I believe that all the information that has finally been released was released for the sake of the officers whom the prosecutor felt needed some sympathy too.
Someone pointed out that The Chinese Killed George Floyd!
He had Fentanyl and (Wuhan) Covid virus in his body.
Many knee-jerk reactions here…
Glad for the clarification that kneeling on someone’s neck for 9 minutes according to written procedures from Israeli security consultants is OK. Likewise, ignoring “I can’t breathe” statements 20 times is OK. And since DUI arrests are by far the most common, neck-kneeling should be SOP for those, too. If someone is intoxicated, no rules to prevent harm apply?
I don’t know about laws in MN or GA, but often charges such as Murder incorporate “lesser included” charges of Voluntary or involuntary Manslaughter. Chauvin will be convicted of something. Finding conspiracy in prosecutions to facilitate more rioting is rubbish.
Chauvin was a bad apple. He should have been fired long before he killed Floyd. Accountability of police misconduct shouldn’t be a determination of the police unions.
In New York, police disciplinary records are to be made public. Turns out the local PD “can’t find” 48 case records and wants the citizen review panel (that has no power in disciplinary actions) to supply the records. The PD apparently destroyed the records and let dozens of complaints lapse beyond the 18 month time limit.
This is all part of the thin blue line – of silence. We need cops, but we should demand professionalism, not goon squads.
Fred:
In my opinion, in the United States, in Domestic or in Foreign policy, neither Democrats nor Republicans can articulate a credible positive set of policies.
Yes, I understand that the Party of the WASPs is strong on the Second Amendment – “We are shipping all the jobs to China, India, Mexico – but you can own as many guns as you like.”
The Rainbow Coalition, on the other hand, states: “We are also shipping all the jobs to China, India, Mexico – but you can dope your way to euphoria, marry a sheep etc.; as you like it.”
Both parties still on the path of foreign wars on behalf of their common religious ideas of Protestantism.
Am I missing something here?
james:
I agree with you.
It appears that one needs to be well informed about fentanyl to fully understand George Floyd’s death.
Soon after Floyd’s death, Scott Adams’s blog had his observations of Floyd’s death. Adams has deep personal knowledge as his stepson died from a fentanyl overdose. Key points I recall were that people on a serious fentanyl dose are incapable of rational thought which makes dealing with them quite challenging. Also, Adams stated that it is quite important to place someone with a serious overdose on their stomach, as leaving them on their back will accelerate the loss of ability to breathe.
And an extensive “forensic” discussion of this event with great detail about the fentanyl overdose process is posted at https://www.unz.com/article/or-did-george-floyd-die-of-a-drug-overdose/
Both suggest to me that one needs to have serious knowledge of how fentanyl overdoses effect users and how they can lead to death to have a reliable view on the role of the police officers in this situation.
James,
Have you taken the two minutes to try the technique yet?
A lot of people here are ignoring that fact that Floyd, with all that junk in his system and in that frame of mind we see on the video, was behind the wheel of a car. Just let him go because it was just a $20 bill? What would the PD say to the families of the victims of the vehicle crash that Floyd may well have caused? The little country of Canada won’t even let an American into the country if they’ve ever had a DUI/DWI on their record. Ever (another fact that you won’t bother to take the two minutes to validate), but Americans should allow highly intoxicated drivers loose on their roads?
Yes, Floyd asked for the knee when he decided to resist arrest, the knee being a safe and effective dept approved means of restraining someone who is resisting and potentially dangerous to self or others.
Babak,
One of your other personalities is hard core for enforcement of The Law.
So is the Babak on this thread ready to talk about stoning women to death for showing a little leg or adultery? How about hanging drug users? All under The Law, of course.
Upstater,
Just showing your ignorance. Police do not have a magical truth detector. Floyd’s repeated claims that “I can’t breath” the application of the knee restraint by at least 5 minutes. He was acting so strange there is no reason to accord him the benefit of the doubt and accept everything he said as true. Second, the knee to the neck was not brought in by the Israelis. You’re an anti-semitic ass. It is an approved technique for restraining someone without causing them harm. The groundless media claims that this caused his death is flat out wrong. You may not like how it looks, but Chauvin and the the other officers were instructed to use this as one method to restrain a suspect. That is not their fault. People like you, with perfect 20/20 hindsight, can easily complain that it should not be use. What other techniques in the MPD training manual do you think should be changed or revised. The most important thing an objective, intelligent viewer can glean from watching the video is that none of the officers used an racial epithets or disparaging insults against Floyd.
Larry,
It would be interesting and helpful to know how many times the knee restraint was used without any harm coming to the suspect. I’d bet hundreds if not thousands across the country in the past 8 years +/-..
This article suggests the restraint was used 237 times by MPD with no deaths and a few injuries occurring as well as instances of the suspect passing out. However, as expected, the article is heavily slanted against the police and it is not internally consistent. We don’t know what other factors are involved, the nature of “injuries”, when they occurred, etc. It also seems to confuse the knee technique with chokeholds when convenient to the anti-police slant. That said, no one had died from the technique – and maybe a violent suspect passing out is not such an undesirable outcome.
I can’t find any scientific articles available on line that describe the use of that type of restraint in the larger of context of dealing with resisting arrest and in comparison to other options.
I know that all options present a level of danger to the suspect, the police and the community. Tasers can – and do – kill from time to time. Same with all “non-lethal” options available to police. It seems the best our armchair quarterbacking friends here can come up with is letting anyone resisting arrest go on their merry way to continue to put the community at risk (e.g. Floyd driving while highly intoxicated).
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/minneapolis-police-rendered-44-people-unconscious-neck-restraints-five-years-n1220416
James,
My comment was in response to “James Doleman”. Sorry for the confusion. I generally agree with your comments.
I have read the Floyd was still on probation in another state. I suspect that contributed to his panicky state. It’s a cold harsh situation: Get in trouble, back to jail you go. Conviction not needed, jail is where you will await your trial. Having been speed-balling of late certainly didn’t help his ability, if any, to deal with stress gracefully.
Some have said he was on the verge of ODing from a depressant but I see no evidence of that from the video. People close to that are limp, chin-down, and uncommunicative. He was near the opposite. What we interpret from the toxicology reporting will be worthless, the jury will accept the coroner’s interpretation. Judging fatal doses is a sketchy undertaking for laymen.
Mark Logan,
This is not “laymen” judging on their own. The medical evidence about what constitutes a lethal dose of fentanyl is quite clear. The amount present in Floyd’s blood was a lethal dose. PERIOD. Deal with the facts and not your opinions.
James,
What happened to Floyd after Officers removed him from the car was entirely appropriate. They did not mishandle him. They did not verbally nor physically abuse him. He was restrained on the ground in accordance with established Minneapolis Police Department procedures as taught at the academy and written in the manual. Now, you may not like those procedures, but that is not the fault of the officers. They are held accountable if they do not follow procedure. Your ignorance of these matters is breathtaking.
james
“is a cheap distraction” This is ad hominem. Do it again and I will ban you.
Larry,
I seen no conclusive evidence that the levels found constitute a lethal dose. Certainly the autopsy did not characterize the levels found as lethal. A quick google search provides experts saying it wasn’t necessarily lethal as well. Are you sure of your analysis?
Babak,
“Party of WASPs…” “The Rainbow Coalition, on the other hand, states: “…. dope your way to euphoria, marry a sheep etc.; as you like it.”
The race and religous baiting is egregious. Yes, you are missing that as boorish as he is personally Trump ran on bringing jobs back and ending involvement in foreign wars. Running on the Republican ticket he defeated a dozen others and then defeated Hilary, who’s support included, however tepid, the Obama wing of the left.
As bumbling as he has been during his time in office he has managed to have the press show themselves as incompetent, biased and corrupt. He has drawn into the public view the fact that many career professionals in government at all levels are biased, incompetent and corrupt. He has also cut bureaucratic red tape, cut illegal immigration, and began the first phase of on-shoring manufacturing capabilities into the US. He even managed to do something for working and middle class black families econically that did not consist of race based set-assides or handouts.
The left hates him all the more for that, and it is one reason they are destroying as much of the inner city economies as they can – to enforce reliance on government at all cost so as to keep 1/3 of their voting base dependent upon the democratic party office holders. They won’t survive as a party unless they can successfully continue discrediting the concept that being “American” transcends racial lines, that there are redemptive qualities in all men and that historical faults can be transcended; thus they continue to divide upon racial lines, instill a learned helplessness and project outward a collective guilt upon the history of the country, and by association the inheritence of guilt – or victimhood – of Americans.
Jame’s,
I am not an insurance “agent”.
My point about Canada is that, liberal as Canada is, your country still takes driving under the influence extremely seriously; so seriously it bars entry to anyone who has *ever* been convicted of DUI. That is relevant to both the Floyd case and the case in Atlanta that also resulted in riots and police being fired and arrested themselves. So I think it is highly disingenuous for people to characterize the arrests as being over a $20 bill or merely “sleeping” in his car.
So once the police got Floyd out of the car, what were they supposed to do with him? Allow him – a known violent felon – to roam the streets in an extremely intoxicated state? Would that be safe for Floyd? For the citizens of the city? What message would that send to other would be wasted drivers? Your country wants to send a strong message about intoxicated driving; mine is not allowed to?
Given that you must now admit that Floyd needed to be arrested, everything that Larry said in response applies.
What gets me are the calls for the police to “provide CPR” to a person claiming to have “just” had Covid (didn’t we just shut down the country for this highly infectious disease) and who is undoubtedly high or crazy. Chauvin has been pilloried in the media for if not outright murder at least indifference, and for not responding to the multiple people at the scene trying to cause issues with the police.
I’ve noticed a disconcerting pattern with these highly publicized cases of supposed officer brutality that started with Philando Castile. In the video released by the new agencies, but not reported in the transcripts or any public testimony I clearly heard the deceased volunteer that he has a gun in the car. Then the officer says that’s ok, just don’t reach for it. The next part in the transcript says “inaudible”. But I heard clearly him say “I gonna have to reach for it” in an agitated manner. Cop says “don’t pull it out” he responds “i’m gonna pull it out”. I assume the pistol was in his pocket with his ID. Within a split seconds the cop reaches in and grabs the reaching arm and yells at him not to reach for his pistol and they struggle before shots ring out. I believe this was the video i first watched.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MY7wk5LDM4o
The video even on you tube, from CBS, doesn’t appear to have the same audio. Perhaps it was “cleaned up”? The volume levels are different but in some of the video the driver never says he is pulling out his firearm. Dunno, maybe I have super hearing or an active imagination.
Fred:
I stand by what I have stated.
What is the (American) Right’s positive program of action?
Where is “Hope” in where they stand: public squalor, private splendor.
What is Right’s view of the activities of one Eddie Lampert?
You cannot beat the Left with Nothing.
james
It does not matter if you see it as ad hominem. I do.
Babak,
Perhaps you should change the tv channel. You read like a propaganda piece reader not an autotive industry professional in SE Michigan. Nobody on the right is promoting public squalor, though there’s plenty of evidence of that being spread around in cities run by the democrats, as you are well aware. There have been plenty of broadcasts with Trump administartion officials explaining trade policy, a variety of domestic policies, and foreign policies as well. Too bad about sear, which bought out kmart years ago. One rich guy, who I had to google to find out who you were talking about, didn’t run the companies into the dirt all by his lonesome.
“You cannot beat the Left with Nothing.” Try here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0723ug6nP3k
Attend one, oh, wait, the left won’t let them happen anymore. I wonder why……
Jame’s,
I am a senior manager in health insurance business analytics. It’s my job to use data and other objective means to develop an actionable understanding of challenges and opportunities. I’ve been in that career for about 20 years. I’m 56 now. That’s a hint that I’m not just some guy that landed a corporate job right out of college, if you’re implying that a corporate desk jockey doesn’t know anything about physical confrontations.
Anyhow, where do you see evidence of racism in the Floyd video? I see cops being extremely polite to to an incoherent and somewhat beligerent Floyd and I see cops of a few different races involved. What systemic racism in America? This is where your existence as a “Canuck” comes into play. How much time have you spent in the US? Yet you seem to know that we are all racists. Well, I disagree strongly.
Have you experimented with the neck restraint yet? No? Yet you seem to know all about that too. You tell me, from your extensive experience controlling large, resisting, intoxicated men with violent felon histories, what a better way to restrain Floyd would have been per dept guidelines. You know that sitting on his back would cause chest compression that could suffocate, right? How many cops should have been involved. In what way? What would be happening elsewhere in the city if so many cops came to help out? How would Floyd have been restrained while waiting for the reinforcements? How would the lethal dose of drugs in his system not have killed Floyd while waiting for those resources or whatever other plan you think more appropriate?
Babak,
“American Right’s Positive Program of Action” and “Guns”.
You probably are not familiar with this, but the firearm industry, and the past 12+ years of gun sales boom, has been responsible for creating many thousands of gunsmithing and other light manufacturing jobs. Not to mention the thousands of tinkerers designing and making all of the firearm accessories.
[Yes, also a lot of overseas factory jobs from making some of those components, too.]
American gun making is a highly decentralized, craftsmanship, business. In part, we have the Democrats and Brady Campaign to thank, for making size a negative. They sued all of the big companies into downsizing.
So yes, the Second Amendment is responsible for keeping and creating many manufacturing jobs in America for the Republicans.
Jimmy_w
Thank you for sharing that information.
Fred
Who is responsible for the destruction of Detroit?
The Left?
Or was it the Right?
Or may be the Center?
Who decided not to invest in the United States, her people and her infrastructure?
It was not the immigrants, the Chinese, the Blacks who made those decisions.
That much is certain.
And spare me about the Great Orange White Hope; I am still waiting for his Great Healthcare Plan.
Larry said: “You’re an anti-semitic ass.”
This is typical Israel-firster insult, a conflation of any negative mention of Israel with anti-semitism. It is a cheap cop out. I stand corrected that the knee hold was not taught by the Israelis. But the MPD has, in fact, received training from Israeli Security consultants (just like China).
“People like you, with perfect 20/20 hindsight” is precious, too. People — and cops — that don’t learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. Just how many times have these incidents resulted in riots? What was the taxpayer cost of Ferguson, Rodney King, and now Floyd? Isn’t there a lesson to be learned?
Our host has written extensively over years about the disasters that the US has been involved in MENA. It STILL has not learned from its mistakes and throws more treasure and lives down the toilet. Just like the MPD has now accomplished for the whole country by not learning from history.
Just because kneeling on Floyd’s next was an approved, written policy of MPD doesn’t mean Chauvin wasn’t behaving like a brutal goon. He didn’t decide to remove his knee until the guy was dead. It doesn’t matter if he was intoxicated or not.
The sooner MPD is disbanded and reorganized as a new agency the better. Any cop with a litany of 17 complaints like Chauvin should be fired. There should be no labor contract with police unions (they protect bad apples and juice overtime). The US military has no unions; why are cops special?
To reiterate — we need good, professional police. We don’t need goons.
Upstater: You’re the one who raised the “Israeli”/Jewish trope. Not me. And then you concede that you had no evidence whatsoever for your specious claim. What’s worse is your continued propaganda about the police as “goons.” If you took time to watch the entire video, which it appears you have not, you’d see that the police handled Floyd appropriately. You’ve never been a cop and you’ve never been in the position of having to make snap judgments with a drug crazed suspect. This entire affair was inflamed and propagandized on a lie. I’ll repeat–at no time during the entire encounter with Floyd was any racial epithet or racially induced violence present. None. Those officers just had the bad luck to detain someone who was dying from a fentanyl overdose.
BTW, if you knew anything about me you’d know how ridiculous and unfounded your “Israeli Firster” smear is. I’ve been very critical of Israel’s tactics with the Palestinians. No comparison with what the police in Minneapolis did. You have no shame.
Babak,
You obviously aren’t the same Babak that posted here before.
Who was Coleman Young? Who is Kwame Kilpatrick – also who were his parents and just what did they do for decades; Who was Congresswoman Deborah Dingell’s predecessor in office, and for how long, and what were his decisions regarding trade policy? What policies was she promoting while at GM? Who did the “immigrants” you mention vote for once becoming citizens, how about the black Americans?
Upstater,
I look forward to Trump reforming the Minneapolis police force since it is apparent four decades of Democrat-Farm Labor leadership is not up to the job of running a professional police for in the city.
James,
It is common for artistic people to mistake how they feel about something as being objective reality.
Fred:
Ah, I see – the Republicans were only in the same room as the Democrats when all of this transpired.
Babak,
Avoiding answering who actually ran the city of Detroit into the ground since the late 1960s doesn’t change the fact of which party, and which party’s ideology, ran the city for the past five decades.
Please re-read my original comment. “Jewish” does not appear. You imagined it. You’re baiting.
And a cop like Chauvin with 17 complaints from the public is a major problem. There are 800 other MPD officers and I doubt the vast majority have any complaints lodged against them.
Whether race was an issue is completely irrelevant. The police union protects such goons and the public picks up the tab.
Allegedly it was drugs in the workplace, bussing in the suburbs, and competition from Japan that drove MoTown into the ground – the car industry; not the music which saw ascendency during the same time period. And also the publication of “Wheels” – an insider view of the auto assembly works.