Chauvin, at this moment he suffocated Floyd, a crime that cost him more than 20 years in prison
A Federal Court The United States sentenced police officer Derek Chauvin to 21 years in prison for choking George Floyd with one knee in 2020.
The 46-year-old ex-cop He had already been sentenced to 22 and a half years imprisonment by a Minnesota state court, but appealed the sentence.
It will serve the penalties at the same timeand you can do it in a federal prison, rather than a Minnesota state penitentiary, where is kept in solitary confinement to protect him from other inmates.
The federal sanction for “violation of civil rights” of the African American is definitive because it derives from his acceptance of guilt.
“I don’t really know why he did what he did,” US District Court Judge Paul Magnuson said in the ruling.
“But putting your knee on someone else’s neck until they die is wrong“and” you must be substantially punished, “he said, as reproduced by the AFP news agency.
During a short speech, Derek Chauvin wished George Floyd’s children “success in life” but neither apologized nor expressed remorse.
Her mother, Carolyn Pawlenty, assured that she was not a ruthless racist and added that “all lives matter, whatever the color of their skin”, paraphrasing the motto Black Lives Matter.
The brother of the late Philonise Floyd has claimed “the maximum sentence” for Derek Chauvin and said that since the tragedy he has not been able to sleep.
George Floyd’s murder and the first trial
On May 25, 2020, this Minneapolis police officer stopped and restrained George Floyd by pressing one knee to his neck for nearly ten minutes, indifferent to protests from passers-by and the victim’s groans.
The scene, filmed and posted online, sparked mass demonstrations against racism and police violence, both in the United States and abroad.
During a carefully watched trial in the Minnesota state court in 2021, his attorney alleged that George Floyd died of an overdose and health problems and that Derek Chauvin had used justifiable force.
An argument that did not convince the jury, who found him guilty of murder and sentenced him to 22 and a half years in prison. He challenged the sentence.
At the same time, federal justice opened its own trial accusing him and his three former colleagues of George Floyd’s “violation of constitutional rights”, notably of “not having been the victim of unreasonable use” of force by a police officer. .
These “double” prosecutions are authorized in the United States, but are relatively rare and reflect the importance of this dossier which has reignited a heated debate about America’s racist past.
In the federal case he first pleaded not guilty, but in December 2021 he changed his strategy and for the first time recognized some responsibility for the events.
He admitted he used force, “knowing it was wrong” and “without legal justification”.
He also admitted he misbehaved to a 14-year-old black teenager in 2017, who he held on to the ground by pressing his knee for a quarter of an hour.
“I hope he uses the time he has in front of him to think about what he could have done differently,” said the young man, John Pope, during Thursday’s court hearing.
The other three officers, who remained passive during George Floyd’s ordeal, were found guilty in February by a federal court, but their sentences have not yet been pronounced.
The state justice also accuses them of complicity in murder. One of them, Thomas Lane, pleaded guilty and will be sentenced on 21 September. The trial of the other two, Tou Thao and Alexander Kueng, will begin on 24 October.
With information from agencies
DB
Source: Clarin
