On Thursday, a federal jury convicted three former Minneapolis policemen guilty of violating George Floyd of his constitutional rights by refusing to assist the restrained Black man trapped beneath their coworker’s knee, Reuters reported.
The jury also determined that officers Tou Thao, 36, J. Alexander Kueng, 28, and Thomas Lane, 38, caused Floyd’s death during the arrest on May 25, 2020, a conclusion that may impact the harshness of their sentences.
It’s an uncommon occurrence that a police officer is held criminally liable for the use of excessive force by a colleague. Floyd’s civil right to medical assistance was denied by all three men while he was in police custody.
Thao and Kueng were also found guilty of violating Floyd’s right to be free of excessive use of force by failing to intervene when their coworker Derek Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes. Chauvin was found guilty of Floyd’s murder in a state court last year.
Thao, Kueng, and Lane will be released on bond until their sentencing hearing, which has not yet been set. Prosecutors have not yet decided on a punishment, but the men might face years in jail.
“This is just accountability,” Philonise Floyd told reporters after the verdict was read. “It could never be justice because I can never get my brother back.”
The decision came only two days after a Georgia jury convicted three white men guilty of federal hate crimes in the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery, a young Black man who was shot while fleeing through a predominantly white community.
Federal prosecutors said in U.S. District Court in St. Paul that the men owed it to Floyd, who pleaded for his life until collapsing beneath Chauvin’s knee, because of their training and “basic human decency.”
Floyd’s death spurred protests against law enforcement violence and racism in cities throughout the world.
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