Chauvin is expected to admit to civil rights violations by George Floyd

ST. Paul, Minn. (AP) – Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin will appear in person in federal court Wednesday morning to change his guilty plea hearing in which he is expected to plead guilty to the offense. George Floyd’s Civil Rights.

Although ‘s schedule change hearing suggests a guilty plea is imminent, the details of which have not been made public and nothing will be made official until Chauvin pleads guilty in court and the deal is accepted by a judge.

Chauvin, who is white, is charged with disqualifying Floyd on two counts of pinning his knee to Floyd’s neck when the black man said he could not breathe and for failing to provide medical care to Floyd. Floyd in May 25, 2020, arrest resulting in Floyd’s death. Chauvin has been convicted of murder and manslaughter and is serving a sentence of 22 and a half years.

He faces two more charges in a separate case involving the restraint of a black teenager in 2017. It is not clear at this time whether there will be any change of defense in that case as it was not part of the scheduling notice sent by the court.

Floyd’s arrest and death, captured on cellphone video by a bystander, sparked massive nationwide protests calling for an end to racial inequality and police mistreatment. close to Blacks.

Chauvin and three other former officers – Thomas Lane, J. Kueng and Tou Thao – have was indicted earlier this year on federal charges accused them of intentionally violating Floyd’s rights. A federal trial against three other men is still scheduled for January.

To bring federal charges of police-related deaths, prosecutors must believe that an officer acted in “the color of the law,” or government power, and knowingly deprived someone’s constitutional right. That is a high legal standard. An accident, bad judgment, or simple negligence of the officer is not enough to support federal charges. Prosecutors must prove the officer knew what he was doing was wrong at the time but still did it.

According to evidence in the state lawsuit against Chauvin, Kueng and Lane helped restrain 46-year-old Floyd while he was on the ground – Kueng knelt on Floyd’s back and Lane held Floyd’s feet. Thao prevented the people around and did not allow them to interfere during 9 1/2 minutes of restraint.

All four former officers have been widely charged in federal court for disenfranchising Floyd from acting under government authority, but the federal indictment breaks down the charges even further. The first sentence against Chauvin alleges he violated Floyd’s right not to be arrested without cause and unjustified force by a police officer when he kept his knee on Floyd’s neck, even when Floyd was not. react.

The second number accused Chauvin of intentionally depriving Floyd of his liberty without due process, including the right not to be “intentionally indifferent to his serious medical needs.”

In a 2017 case involving a then 14-year-old boy, Chauvin was accused of depriving the boy, who was handcuffed and not resisted, the right to be excused from unreasonable force when he held his throat, beat him little. head with a flashlight and keep your knees on the boy’s neck and upper back while he is in the prone position.

According to a police report from that 2017 encounter, Chauvin wrote that the teen resisted arrest and after the teenager, whom he described as 6 feet 2 tall and weighed about 240 pounds, handcuffed, Chauvin “used his body weight to pin” him to the floor. The boy had a bleeding ear and needed two stitches.

That encounter was one of several mentioned in state court filings that prosecutors said showed Chauvin used tethers to the neck or head and upper torso seven times prior to the incident. In 2014, including four times state prosecutors said he went too far and kept restraints “beyond indicating when such force is needed in situations.” “

Three other former officers are still expected to appear in court on federal charges in January, and they face state trial for abetting and abetting in March.