In a legal sense, George Floyd was killed by the physical restraint applied by police last Memorial Day on a Minneapolis street. There is less in that assertion than may appear at first blush.
Causation is only one component of the prosecution. Prosecutors still have a heavy lift in establishing Chauvin’s intent if they are to convict him on either of the two murder counts, rather than the manslaughter charge.
While the prosecution will make the legal argument that absent the police actions that George Floyd would still be alive, the defense will argue that absent the underlying health conditions and drug ingestion that George Floyd would also still be alive. It was pretty clear that Baker believes that the death was the result of all of the conditions present and Nelson got similar admissions from all but one of the states medical experts. Certainly the defense will put forward people who will lay the burden of death largely on Floyd.
At that point it becomes a matter (as McCarthy argues) regarding intent. Unless the prosecution can prove that the restraint was administered with an intent to either assault or kill Floyd, then you have not proven murder.
In fact they have made no real explicit legal arguments or provided no explicit legal testimony that is suggesting either a motive for Chauvin to want to harm Floyd or any known proof that he intended to do so. Instead, they are attempting to make the actions out to be so egregious that "intent" becomes obvious and therefore assumed. I might even argue that the prosecution would like the jury to forget about intent or motive all together, but I doubt that Nelson and the defense will allow that.
This is why, even if the state believes they have proven causation, that they seem desperate to prove that the actions of Chauvin and the police would have killed a normal healthy person, rather than just been a contributing factor in a medically compromised person who has a large (possibly lethal) amount of drugs in his system. Establishing that concept would undercut the idea that the police were following training and procedures, and by proxy they hope it would prove the motive and intent that they clearly otherwise lack.
On the flipside, failure to show the the actions of the police would have killed a normal person, would mean that Floyd largely contributed to his own death. At that point you would be asking a jury to convict police officers for simply arresting and restraining someone who did actually break the law and did violently resist arrest. If the intent was actually to perform normal police work in a manner they felt was best in the situation, then they certainly didn't commit murder. No more than a surgeon commits murder when someone dies on their operating table, or a fire-fighter commits murder if they pull someone from a fire too late to save them. Sometimes people die under the care of public servants.
If you want my humble opinion, if Nelson proves to be as apt and able presenting his case as he has been battling the State's case, then murder may be off the table and the battle may come down to proving manslaughter. Which, is a whole other can of worms, for a whole other post.
34 comments:
I’m still trying to understand what a defensive slam dunk could be, other than an own goal.
I guess it would help the "no slam dunk" theory if there was not video of a man lying helplessly handcuffed on his face in the street with several officers holding him down and one kneeling with a knee on his neck while the man says he can't breathe and begs not to be killed and calls out Momma while bystanders on the sidewalk repeatedly admonish the kneeling officer to at least remove his knee from the man's neck, and this went on for nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds.
None of the charges against Chauvin demand proof that he actually intended to kill Floyd. The most serious, second-degree murder, requires the prosecution to prove that Chauvin’s kneeling on Floyd’s neck was a felony assault that caused Floyd’s death. A lesser charge, third-degree murder, requires proof that the act caused Floyd’s death and was “eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, without regard for human life.” The least serious of the charges, second-degree manslaughter, requires proof that Chauvin displayed “culpable negligence,” creating an unreasonable risk, and that he consciously took “chances of causing death or great bodily harm.”
No reasonable person viewing the video of Floyd’s death could conclude that the force that Chauvin used was necessary. Floyd was handcuffed and lying facedown on the pavement during the agonizingly long period that Chauvin’s knee was on his neck. Nevertheless, the prosecution has devoted multiple trial days to establishing that Chauvin’s act was excessive. Multiple police officers and experts have clearly and repeatedly said that the force Chauvin used was disproportionate to any possible physical danger that Floyd presented in the moment. Jody Stiger, a use-of-force expert in the Los Angeles Police Department, testified that, once Floyd was subdued, “no force should have been used.” A lieutenant in the Minneapolis Police Department, Richard Zimmerman, said that it was “totally unnecessary.” The department’s police chief, Medaria Arradondo, who fired Chauvin the day after Floyd’s death and called his act a “murder,” said at trial that Chauvin’s maneuver “in no way, shape, or form is anything that is by policy,” and that it “is not part of our training.” In response, the defense asked questions suggesting that, even if Floyd, who’d initially resisted arrest, appeared to have been adequately subdued, it was reasonable for an officer not to let up on the force for fear that the suspect could suddenly rise up again and pose a real danger. These suggestions were mostly rebuffed by the prosecution’s witnesses, but they will be central to the defense case.
Even if the prosecution succeeds in establishing that Chauvin’s use of force was excessive and constituted assault, or evinced his “depraved mind” or “culpable negligence,” any homicide conviction still requires proof that his actions actually caused Floyd’s death. The Hennepin County medical examiner’s autopsy report found that Floyd’s heart and lungs stopped while Chauvin’s knee was on his neck, and that his death was a homicide. The report also found that Floyd had heart disease and drugs in his system. The fact that Floyd had used drugs, which may have been a contributing factor in his death, is not necessarily a problem for the prosecution—it does not need to prove that Chauvin’s act was the only cause. Martin Tobin, a pulmonologist, gave expert testimony that the compression of Floyd’s body, while his hands were pulled behind his back in handcuffs, caused his death “from a low level of oxygen.” Tobin also concluded that any drugs in his system did not affect his breathing, and that “a healthy person subjected to what Mr. Floyd was subjected to would have died.”
The defense’s best possibility of avoiding conviction is to introduce doubt about the cause of death—in particular, about whether Floyd would have died had he not had drugs in his system. The defense attorney Eric Nelson argued, in his opening statement, that Floyd “died of a cardiac arrhythmia that occurred as a result of hypertension, his coronary disease, the ingestion of methamphetamine and fentanyl, and the adrenaline flowing through his body.” If Nelson manages to inspire doubt about the cause of death in the mind of just one person on the jury, then it will be unable to find Chauvin guilty of any of the charges against him. As the defense presents its case, in the coming days, I would expect it to feature a barrage of technical information on the effect of the drugs in Floyd’s body, which will aim not so much to persuade as to confuse jurors, shaking their confidence that the cause of death was asphyxiation by Chauvin’s knee. This may not be easy to do. The application of the legal concept of causation to medical evidence can be made technical or complicated, but my observation has been that jury conclusions on causation most often track with moral intuitions about responsibility.
An experienced lawyer is saying what I have come to believe.
Unless the defendant's attorney can provide reasonable doubt about the manslaughter case against Officer Chauvin, he will spend a few years in prison.
The burden of truth for either murder charges can be rebuked by the defendants attorney. Contributing factors will not convince the jurors that he intended to kill George Floyd.
Yes someone else wrote most of this but he is a lawyer and I am a lawyer.
The link will follow later on today
I am not a lawyer. I hate it when I miss type
Contributing factors on any homicide conviction still requires proof that his actions actually caused Floyd’s death.
As of today I would not vote for convict or the murder charges. The most important is that intent is a high crime, but despite my feelings about Officer Chauvin.
Like Scott, I would not have a drink with him.
Jeannie Suk Gersen is a contributing writer to The New Yorker and a professor at Harvard Law School.
Not a conservative computer technology expert
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/the-simple-facts-of-derek-chauvins-trial
I think that manslaughter is a slam dunk.
But we will see next week
Chauvin displayed “culpable negligence,” creating an unreasonable risk, and that he consciously took “chances of causing death or great bodily harm.”
No reasonable person viewing the video of Floyd’s death could conclude that the force that Chauvin used was necessary.
The defense lawyer better get some rest today and then spend Sunday Funnies on Thecoldheartedtruth troll squad lolololololololololol
Even though he's a conservative, but Andrew McCarthy is clearly correct.
Whether Derek Chauvin had the intent to apply excessive force on George Floyd, to the point of criminal assault, remains a very live disputed issue. It is no longer plausible, however, to claim that police restraint did not cause Floyd’s death. In the legal sense of causation, it surely did.
I won't predict!
Mike Pence pleaded for help.
We need help,” Schumer, D-N.Y., said in desperation, more than an hour after the Senate chamber had been breached.
At the Pentagon, officials were discussing media reports that the mayhem was not confined to Washington and that other state capitals were facing similar violence in what had the makings of a national insurrection.
“We must establish order,” said Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a call with Pentagon leaders.
But order would not be restored for hours.
These new details about the deadly riot are contained in a previously undisclosed document prepared by the Pentagon for internal use that was obtained by The Associated Press and vetted by current and former government officials.
The timeline adds another layer of understanding about the state of fear and panic while the insurrection played out, and lays bare the inaction by then-President Donald Trump and how that void contributed to a slowed response by the military and law enforcement. It shows that the intelligence missteps, tactical errors and bureaucratic delays were eclipsed by the government’s failure to comprehend the scale and intensity of a violent uprising by its own citizens.
With Trump not engaged, it fell to Pentagon officials, a handful of senior White House aides, the leaders of Congress and the vice president holed up in a secure bunker to manage the chaos.
While the timeline helps to crystalize the frantic character of the crisis, the document, along with hours of sworn testimony, provides only an incomplete picture about how the insurrection could have advanced with such swift and lethal force, interrupting the congressional certification of Joe Biden as president and delaying the peaceful transfer of power, the hallmark of American democracy.
The Associated Press
while the insurrection played out, and lays bare the inaction by then-President Donald Trump and how that void contributed to a slowed response by the military and law enforcement.
We need help,” Schumer, D-N.Y., said in desperation, more than an hour after the Senate chamber had been breached
They’ve got Gadsden flags on their walkers, and a lot of replaced hips seem to be among them.
My god you are a pussy
John Hayward
https://twitter.com/Doc_0/status/1380545845062434816
Hi there, "anti-fascist" activists! Clinton and Obama intelligence officials lied to the American people about Hunter Biden's laptop and colluded with private social media companies to meddle in the 2020 election. Anything to say about that?
Glenn Greenwald
https://mobile.twitter.com/MaxAbrahms/status/1380539628625797120
Everyone knows now that the Hunter Biden documents -- including those raising questions about Joe's participation in his China deals -- are authentic, but admitting that is a scandal given what they & Facebook did, so they've trained liberals to think any mention of it is trivial
Max Abrahms
I want to hear from all the intel hacks who testified that Hunter’s laptop was Russian disinformation. That’s the scariest part to me — how the intel community unites, openly lies to Americans & hardly anyone cares. The stakes are sometimes much higher.
Obama Crime Family
Biden Crime Family
Crooked "intelligence" agencies
Partisan and Crooked FBI
Banana Republic
State Media
FAKE NEWS
“Clear the Capitol,” Pence said
My god you are a pussy Mr . Vice President Pence!
None of the charges against Chauvin demand proof that he actually intended to kill Floyd. The most serious, second-degree murder, requires the prosecution to prove that Chauvin’s kneeling on Floyd’s neck was a felony assault that caused Floyd’s death. A lesser charge, third-degree murder, requires proof that the act caused Floyd’s death and was “eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, without regard for human life.”
Roger...
Why do you comment when you fail to read:
From my post:
At that point it becomes a matter (as McCarthy argues) regarding intent. Unless the prosecution can prove that the restraint was administered with an intent to either assault or kill Floyd, then you have not proven murder.
Even manslaughter according to Minnesota law requires the state to prove that a conscious decision was made to create a unreasonably dangerous situation. Which means that Chauvin would have had to had known that what he was doing was unreasonable under the circumstances of doing his job. It still requires an intent or understanding that what he was doing was dangerous.
Again in Minnesota law, second degree murder requires someone to have died while committing felony. A felony assault (which is what the prosecution is going for) in Minnesota requires that the assault be above and beyond just inflicting bodily harm, generally requiring a substantial injury (such as a fracture or disability).
Given Chauvin and the other officers could have been justified using a taser or even batons on someone who is resisting arrest, and given using your weight to hold someone down is considered towards the bottom of the list in terms of police force... felony assault is a tough sell without showing that Chauvin had a real solid intent to injure him.
No reasonable person viewing the video of Floyd’s death could conclude that the force that Chauvin used was necessary. Floyd was handcuffed and lying facedown on the pavement during the agonizingly long period that Chauvin’s knee was on his neck.
While I respect that this person went to Harvard law, she clearly is not actually watching the trial, or not watching it very carefully.
The jury saw the same pictures at other angles that the use of force experts did... when both use of force experts admitted that the knee was not actually across the neck, but actually more on the trapezoid or shoulder area. The both admitted that the position was not "lethal".
This was reinforced by Dr Baker who suggested that the knee was not in a position to have actually blocked any airways within Floyd. So far only one of the doctors has suggested that the knee blocked any airways and that was Tobin who argued it blocked the hypopharynx.
At least one of the use of force experts admitted that he, himself, had been in situations were a suspect was restrained for 10 minutes or more. But the issue with both of these witnesses appeared not to be the restraint, but rather then length of time. I suspect we will hear much more from defense providing other examples of suspects being held down for longer than ten minutes.
More over, the defense introduced studies that showed that the prone position is neither lethal or all that dangerous.
While I appreciate the call to emotion about what most people saw on tape, clearly what is being shown to the jury is "more" than just what the general public is seeing.
I have the distinct impression that this person had already made up their mind as not really paying attention to the trial as many others are.
You always discredit people who don't agree with you Scott.
A Harvard degree is more important than a computer technology study.
You always discredit people who don't agree with you Scott.
Was anything I wrote incorrect Roger?
I don't claim to be an attorney, nor do I claim to understand the law better than her. But what I am suggesting is that she is not paying much attention to the case, because she is still making reference to things that are no longer considered true.
If she is watching the trial and paying close attention and happened to miss the fact that even the prosecution has stopped claiming that Chauvin's knee was across his neck and is now saying "neck area" - then she isn't very good at observation.
Perhaps you can be a good lawyer and not be observant.
But you cannot make it in my field if you don't pay attention and miss obvious things.
Because she was not paying attention, is an attempt to discredit her.
You assumed she wasn't paying attention because you don't have anything to prove she's wrong about anything but what you said
I figured you out about the Georgia legislation that makes it more complicated to vote for Democrats!
Your constitutional rights will be even safer, because Democrats will be less likely to win.
Babylon bee
If the jury decides Chauvin caused Floyd’s death, it should rule accordingly. It should not rule based upon Thecoldheartedtruth's distractions and again discrediting higher educated Asian women.
Manslaughter because they can't prove intent unless someone else provide social media comments on race.
The sentence for a first-degree manslaughter can range up to 15 years in prison and up to $30,000 in fines or both. In most cases, the defendant will only serve 7-10 years. The sentence for second-degree manslaughter could net a defendant up to 10 years in prison.
Roger...
He isn't charged with first degree manslaughter.
But thanks for once again proving your legal expertise.
As for the Harvard law grad attorney... even she is admitting that juries often times ignore technical information in favor of their own intuitions. Which is to say that she believe they will not vote within the confines of logic or because of information... but rather by a gut feeling.
Of course people have been burned believing that emotional arguments against people like George Zimmerman or others who were charged with high profile murders of black people would work, when in the end the juries "surprised" the mainstream pundits by sticking with the facts.
Perhaps those people were surprised because they were not paying attention?
At this point I would not be shocked with any verdict.
Perhaps most of the jury members are doing the same as the liberals posting on Twitter. Which is admittedly not paying any attention to the defense because Nelson "irritates" them. Perhaps all the jury is getting out of any of this is the bullet points offered on direct (such as what you read in the nightly MSM recap) and they are falling asleep during cross. Then, I could see a murder conviction.
Or perhaps they are more inclined to be seeing things the way Branca, Mccarthy and other legal analysts see it. Those who believed that Nelson owned the defense for the first eight day of the trial, had some issues on Thursday, but recovered on Friday. Perhaps they will actually start to wonder why none of the States witnesses can really keep anything straight. One argues one thing, then someone else contradicts that, and then another person comes around and argues a third option.
1) MMA professional argues blood choke hold
2) Tobin argues blockage of the hypopharynx but no blood choke.
3) Smock argues that Floyd crushed to death but no choke. Says not enough Fentanyl to affect him.
4) Thomas argues similar issue to Smock regarding prone position. Admits enough Fentanyl to kill him is in his system.
5) Baker argues that it was medical, drug, and finally when the police took him into custody he had had enough. But argues no choke, or airway blockage of any kind, and that there was enough Fentanyl in his system to kill someone.
To some degree this was likely forced rather than by design. But as Nelson shots holes into some of these possibilities they have to adjust. Perhaps the jury sees it as if the prosecution is trying to fit a round peg into a square hole and have not established anything "clear".... Then they might acquit across the board.
If I was a betting man, I might suggest that the most likely scenario is the second degree manslaughter, where they see it as basically a means to draw a consensus and compromise. Perhaps they no longer believe that he was actively trying to kill Floyd, but they want to hold someone accountable and Chauvin is that guy?
I didn't say 1st degree manslaughter. But he's probably going to prison for second degree manslaughter Scott
The sentence for second-degree manslaughter could net a defendant up to 10 years in prison.
They will want him accountable and Chauvin is that guy!!!@!
Off topic but
In Gallup polling throughout the first quarter of 2021, an average of 49% of U.S. adults identified with the Democratic Party or said they are independents who lean toward the Democratic Party. That compares with 40% who identified as Republicans or Republican leaners. The nine-percentage-point Democratic advantage is the largest Gallup has measured since the fourth quarter of 2012.
Very interesting.
Even a marxists
LOS ANGELES — Patrisse Khan-Cullors, the leader of Black Lives Matter and a self-described Marxist, recently purchased a $1.4 million home in an exclusive Los Angeles neighborhood where the vast majority of residents are white, according to reports.
The home, which features three bedrooms and three bathrooms, is nestled in Topanga Canyon and has a separate guesthouse on the property, according to a celebrity real estate blog which reported the transaction last week.
The property, which is about a 15 minute drive from Malibu beaches, features bamboo floors and vaulted ceilings, according to the listing.
Topanga Canyon is a location to sprawling homes where 88 percent of the residents are white. After the sale of the property was made public, critics took to social media to blast Khan-Cullors, New York Post reported.
I may be a canceled man in some corners. I may even be a wanted man by the Deep State.
But I hear the millions of Americans who feel forgotten, canceled, ignored, marginalized and targeted.
I draw confidence knowing that the silent majority is growing louder every day.
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