QUESTIONS

The Chauvin trial:  

                                                  I

I thought the prosecution put on an overwhelming case. The evidence that Chauvin unlawfully caused the untimely death of George Floyd was convincing and unimpeachable. The best the defense could do in cross-examining the prosecution witnesses was to get one of them to say that Floyd would probably still be alive if he had stayed in the police car.

Question: Wasn’t it the police who let him out of the police car? And didn’t he say “ thank you” when they did that?

Question: So if letting him out of the car was the cause of his death, aren’t the police responsible?

Question: Isn’t it clear that what the police did after he was taken out of the car is what killed Floyd? He was alive, responsive, and even gracious when they took him out of the car. Then they laid him down in a prone position handcuffed behind his back, three officers lying on him, one of them with his knee on his neck, for 9 ½ minutes at a time when he was begging for breath and offering no opposition. So what could possibly be the issue about whether or not they killed him? I can see some discussion about whether this was murder two, murder three, or manslaughter, but what else is there to discuss?

Question: Chauvin refused to testify. A wise move. The prosecution would have sliced him up into tiny little pieces and very likely the jury would’ve learned about the 19 prior complaints against him for excessive use of force. His election not to testify was a no-brainer. The law does not permit, except in rare circumstances, bringing up prior bad acts of the witness, unless he "opens the door" and testifies on direct, in which case he can be cross-examined about his police history.

So why did the judge permit the defense to evince testimony about a prior confrontation in which Floyd was high on drugs? What was the relevance of that testimony? Didn’t the prejudicial value of that testimony outweigh its probative value? There was no doubt that Floyd had ingested drugs. Indeed the prosecution put in the coroner’s report which spelled out in precise chemical detail what drugs and what amounts were in Floyd’s body at the time he was killed.

Question: And if it was proper for the defense to rehearse the history of Floyd’s drug use, didn’t that “open the door” to the history of Chauvin’s abusive behavior? Did the prosecution try? Did they raise it with the judge? If so why didn’t the press

report it?  Bottom line, the prosecution didn’t do it. I dunno why, and nothing I have read or heard in the media explains the decision.

Question: The defense put on a medical expert who contradicted all the prosecution’s experts, and who even contradicted the coroner’s report of an autopsy the witness did not attend. And the witness did not do his own autopsy?

Question: The defense expert also introduced a possible new cause of death into the stew. Carbon monoxide poisoning. He noted Floyd’s head was close to the tailpipe of the running police cruiser. This expert had no evidence that carbon monoxide was the cause of death, no statistics, no science, but he threw it up against the wall anyway. But even if he is correct, hasn’t his testimony incriminated the defendant? It was Chauvin and his colleagues who had complete control of a prostrate, noncombatant prisoner, and they chose to place him face down with his face inches from the tailpipe spewing carbon monoxide from their police vehicle. If it was the carbon monoxide that killed Floyd, then Chauvin is the killer.

                                                            II

In a small town in Minnesota, a 26-year police veteran shot and killed an unarmed black 19-year-old. It is not clear whether he had been pulled over because of a pair of dice dangling from the rearview mirror, or whether the temporary license tag on the new car had expired. At gunpoint, with several police officers in attendance, he was ordered out of the vehicle. He complied and stood while an officer bungled the handcuffing chore. The 19-year-old panicked jumped back into his car and was shot and killed by the veteran police officer while she yelled, “ Taser, Taser, Taser.”

Questions:

Why did the officer even draw her weapon? The subject was unarmed. There was no crowd of hostile onlookers. No one’s life was in danger. There was an order for his arrest because he had been earlier charged with a misdemeanor – so far the press has not revealed the nature of that minor crime.

Is it conceivable the officer mistook her Glock from her Taser? First, the Glock is holstered on the right side of her utility belt, the Taser on the left. The Glock is black, the Taser is yellow. The Glock weighs two pounds, the Taser weighs one quarter of that: 8 ounces. The Glock has a safety device on the trigger on the right side, the Taser has no trigger but is discharged by a button on the left side.

Question: There is no evidence I am aware of that officer Potter set out to kill Daunte Wright, but do not the incredible number and seriousness of Potter’s errors raise the matter beyond negligence? In most jurisdictions, there is a degree of recklessness that, for the purposes of the criminal law, is tantamount to criminal intent. Would Potter have pulled her gun in a traffic stop if Wright had been a white teenager?

Questions:

Title 18, United States Code, section 242, makes it a crime, under color of law, “willfully to deprive a victim of his civil rights.” In the event death results, the guilty party may be “imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.”

Again would the police have pulled Wright over for having dice dangling from his rearview mirror if he were white?

Would Potter have drawn her weapon if Wright were white?

Would Potter have been so unbelievably frantic if it were a white kid at the wheel?

                                                                III

Less than three weeks ago, a Chicago policeman shot and killed a 13-year-0ld Latino boy. Once again the black and Latino community is up in arms. But this case is different. The police were responding to “shots fired.” Two suspects were identified and ran away. The police chased and caught a 21-year-old, but the 13-year-old was faster and didn’t stop. An officer, who believed the boy had a gun, chased him down an alley and called, again and again,” stop and let me see your hands.”

Instead, the boy appeared to retrieve a dark object from his waistband and in one move throw it away and whirl with his hands raised. Too late. Within the fraction of a second it took to accomplish that maneuver the officer had pulled the trigger. So far as the published evidence reveals, there is no indication the officer knew anything about the racial characteristics of the 13- year-old with the gun.

A gun was found nearby. We do not yet have evidence of what it was used for, who used it, etc. We do know that the 13-year- old’s glove and hand had gunshot residue.

At first, the police wanted to publish the cop's body-camera video of the incident, but the family objected. Then they relented.

The black and Latino community of Chicago is upset, Prospective plaintiff’s lawyers are giving television interviews, and tension is building.

Question: So while there are lots of questions to be answered about the activities of that night, I have yet to see in the press the question that occurred to me the moment I read the story. And even though I suspect it will get me into trouble with some of my readers for saying out loud what I suspect many are thinking to themselves, I can’t help but ask it. If it reveals my age, so be it:

The incident occurred at 2:38 AM. What was a 13-year-old doing out at that hour on a school night?

A bientot.

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