Topline
As a verdict nears in the trial of Derek Chauvin amid renewed outrage over police killings, multiple Black leaders involved in calls for reform are emphasizing the necessity that the former Minneapolis Police officer be convicted for George Floyd’s death—and warning of the fallout if he is not.
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) joins demonstrators in a protest outside the Brooklyn Center police ... [+]
Key Facts
Civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who is representing the families of Floyd and Daunte Wright, the 20-year-old fatally shot by Minnesota police last week, told ABC News’s “This Week” the American legal system will have “once again … broken our hearts” if Chauvin is acquitted on murder and manslaughter charges.
“We cannot condone this inhumanity America, we cannot condone this evil that we saw on that video [of Floyd’s arrest],” Crump said during the Sunday morning interview, warning that if the trial’s outcome doesn’t set a new precedent, “people are going to continue having these emotional protests.”
Also speaking during a Sunday appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.), who has been working on a bipartisan policing reform bill, said she’s anticipating outrage if Chauvin is acquitted on all three counts, adding: “We’ve seen people get off with minimal sentences” in “too many of these cases.”
“I don’t think anyone in Minneapolis, frankly anyone in the U.S., and over a good part of the world, would understand any verdict other than guilty,” Bass said.
This comes after fellow Calif. Rep. Maxine Waters (D), speaking at a Saturday night rally in Brooklyn Center, where Wright’s shooting has sparked nearly a week of protests, urged demonstrators to “get more active” and “more confrontational” if Chauvin isn’t found guilty of murder.
Chief Critic
“We cannot let these killings continue,” Waters told a crowd of protesters. “If nothing does not happen, we know we’ve got to not only stay in the streets but we’ve got to fight for justice. But I am very hopeful... that we will get a verdict that says guilty, guilty, guilty. If we do not, we will not go away.”
Key Background
The trial’s conclusion comes amid a resurgence of unrest following the deaths of Wright, who was unarmed when a Brooklyn Center police officer fatally shot him during a traffic stop just 10 miles from where Chauvin’s trial is taking place, and Adam Toledo, a 13-year-old fatally shot by Chicago police last month. While police originally claimed Toledo was shot after an “armed confrontation,” the video appeared to show the teenager without a weapon and his hands in the air at the moment he was fatally shot. Minneapolis—already on high alert since the start of the trial on May 29—has continued to increase security ahead of the verdict with a plan that involves nine state and local agencies The city’s public schools are shifting back to remote learning for the next week over concerns of disruption from the trial’s outcome. Meanwhile, other cities, including New York and Washington, D.C., are also preparing for protests over the trial’s outcome.
What To Watch For
After nearly three weeks of witness testimony and evidence, both the prosecution and defense will give their closing arguments on Monday. Jurors will then be sequestered for deliberations that could take hours, minutes or weeks. Chauvin, a 19-year Minneapolis Police Department veteran, faces charges of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in Floyd’s death.
