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The next episode of “The Story Behind the AP Story” contains sounds and descriptions that some listeners may feel graphic or violent. We recommend the listener’s discretion.
Haya Panjwani, host: In the summer of 2020, as the world was just beginning to grasp the Covid-19 pandemic, a video has surfaced that sparked an unparalleled movement.
Aaron Morrison, Editor: May 25, 2020 George Floyd, a black man from Houston, Texas, was in Minneapolis, where he moved to find employment opportunities.
Panjwani: Aaron Morrison, Race and Ethnic Editor of the AP.
Morrison: And on this day, the store clerk in particular reported that Floyd was allegedly using a forged $20 bill. He was held captive by at least a few officers, particularly at least a few officers named Derek Chaubin, a white police officer, and kneeled on George Floyd’s neck and back for more than nine minutes. Floyd was handcuffed to the ground and essentially demanded that George Floyd be released from the hold while many people were gathering.
George Floyd, recorded video: I can’t breathe! They kill me, they kill me, man.
Morrison: Right there on the street before he takes his last last breath.
Panjuwani: I am Haya Panjuwani. This episode of the story behind the AP story revisits George Floyd’s murder five years later. We hear from those on the ground shortly after Floyd’s death, the trials that followed, and how that summer shaped the emotions around race.
Noreen Nasil is a video journalist who was in Minneapolis covering the city’s reaction to George Floyd’s death.
File – Damara Atkins pays homage to George Floyd on April 23, 2021 at George Floyd Square mural in Minneapolis (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, File)
Noreen Nasir, Video Journalist: I think there was of course a lot of rage at first. And I think some of that rage has turned into the image of destruction we saw, attracting a lot of focus and attention in the media.
Sounds from the 2020 Minneapolis protest: he can’t breathe, can’t breathe, can’t breathe…
Nasir: But I think what was lost in some of that focal point, which is very palpable on earth, was a deep sense of sadness that many people felt. There was a lot of sadness on the ground, especially at the monument site. Going there at various times in the subsequent era, the monument just grew, grew, grew, grew. These are things that make sense for race and racism across the country, and then people were really trying to point out the following days and months.
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One night we were there. Things were really nervous, there were broken buildings and looting was happening. And I spoke to some of the business owners. Many of them also know that they are immigrants. They were many Somali-Americans. They had come to this country. And for them, I could see the contradictory emotions they just had in their own emotions and the way they themselves handled this.
A small group of protesters marched after former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was sentenced to five years in downtown Minneapolis on June 25, 2021. (AP Photo/Jim Mone) Files – Phoenix police officers will gather protesters in Phoenix on June 2, 2020 at a demonstration over the death of George Floyd. (AP Photo/Matt York, File) File – Protesters are holding signs as they marched on May 30, 2020 during a protest against George Floyd’s death in Chicago. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, file) File – Targeting protesters arrested and arrested on May 31, 2020 on South Washington Street, Minneapolis. (Carlos Gonzalez/Star Tribune via AP, File)
To them, they said we were black. We are recognized as black people in this country, we are black people. And at the same time, they say we are also these business owners. We are saddened and we want to protect our business, this is our livelihood. In the businesses we boarded, there were signs that said it was owned by minorities, saying, “Hey, don’t target us.
Panjwani: Amy Forlittie was a crime and court reporter when George Floyd was murdered in 2020.
Editor Amy Fortile: Centerpiece was undoubtedly a video of George Floyd’s final moments bystanders. The prosecutors performed the footage early in the case. They did it for the first time during the opening statement, and the prosecutor told the ju judge to believe your eyes and your eyes, and to believe in what you saw on the video just before the prosecutor returned through trial.
Defense took a different approach with the whole idea of believing what you see, saying that everyone there was taking a different perspective, coming from a different vantage point, and interpreting the events of the day differently. The defense then said Chaubin’s perspective was one of the reasonable police officers.
Many of the testimony said they felt just helpless and could not do anything, and saw Floyd’s life essentially erased and nothing could be done. The teenager who recorded the video said that Chaubin seemed unconcerned and testified that she apologised to George Floyd and woke up at night because she didn’t do more to help him.
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I also remember some very moving words that concluded the discussion. When we spoke about the cause of the death, prosecutor Jerry Blackwell mentioned that this was the heart problem that killed Floyd and that he said he had enlarged his heart. And the prosecutor said, and I’m rephrasing here, he told the ju judge that Derek Chaubin’s heart was too small, and George Floyd did not die.
File – This undated photo provided by the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office in Minnesota on June 3, 2020 shows former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chaubin. (File via the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, via the AP)
Ultimately, six white and six black or multi-ethnic ju-degree judges convicted Chaubin on three counts, including unintended second-degree murder, which was the most serious count against him. After the verdict was read, the crowd gathered in the streets to cheer for it and begin to delight. He later pleaded guilty to the federal government’s number of violating George Floyd’s civil rights.
Panjwani: The nature of some right-wing politicians and social media calls for Chaubin to be forgiven by President Donald Trump.
Forliti: But if so, it’s really important to note that this has no effect on Chauvin’s state murder conviction at all. He will still have to serve the remainder of his state sentence for murder. So he’s not going to leave the Texas prison and be free. He will likely need to return to Minnesota to serve the rest of his sentence.
Morrison: People who may not have understood or supported such calculations have increasingly rejected everything that happened in 2020, liking the mind, so-called orientation, vanishing, or running. They hope that Derek Chaubin is forgiven, and in their view this was not true justice.
Nasir: This happened, of course, at a time when it was in the middle of the pandemic. And I think frustration has been built up in many ways for a while for many. And when this happened it really touched the nerves and it all started igniting it. Everyone was watching this because no one went anywhere. There was nothing to distract me.
And many people were taking part in the protest for the first time. Especially on the issue of racism in the United States, and of course, in the months following his first death, black people actually became a movement. And the movement itself began many years before Trayvon Martin’s death, but in 2020 it really took off the nation in a way we’ve never seen before. And it took off all over the world, where people saw their own interactions with their own police forces, and how racism unfolded in police interactions.
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