Two months after footage of George Floyd’s death went viral, sparking an epidemic of rioting and violence that killed dozens of people and caused untold damage to countless communities across the country, body cam footage of the incident has finally been made available. Published by the Daily Mail after being leaked to the outlet, the additional video (below) lends crucial context to the fatal encounter between Floyd and Officer Derek Chauvin, and gives insight into the states of mind of both men.
Given that this tragic episode and the reaction to it has been the most significant story in the country for two months, and one of the most significant of the past decade, you might think that the media would treat the new evidence as a rather big story. But so far the opposite has been the case. The news media, for the most part, has had a noticeably muted reaction to the footage. One might say suspiciously muted. Perhaps that’s because the story the new footage tells is, at the very least, far more complicated than the one the media and activists have been screaming into our ears since May. That story, with which we are all extremely familiar, is that George Floyd was a compliant and peaceful man who was strangled to death by a racist, anti-black, sociopathic cop. It was straightforward, we were told. Quite literally black and white. And the only opinion one can really have about it is the kind of opinion that is easily expressed on a protest sign.
Of course we’ve known from the beginning that some of this was, to put it gently, not quite accurate. However Floyd was or wasn’t acting on the day of his death, it strains credulity to use a word like “peaceful” to describe a man who once forced his way into a woman’s home and robbed her at gunpoint in front of her child. As for the racism claim, there was perhaps no evidence to disprove it, but neither was any evidence ever presented to support it. It is merely assumed that any white police officer who kills a black suspect no matter the circumstances is motivated, at some level, by racism. Some of them may be so motivated, but the burden of proof is on those who make the claim. Yet those who make the claim rarely acknowledge that there is any burden to meet, much less make any honest attempt to meet it.
Also, anyone following the story has known for sometime that, according to the medical examiner’s report, Floyd was not strangled to death and did not die from asphyxiation as the media had so confidently declared in the immediate aftermath. It was found that Floyd — who had a pre-existing heart condition and three illicit drugs in his system, including fentanyl, which is 50 times more potent than morphine and known to cause respiratory distress — died of “cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restrain, and neck compression.” A medical examination performed by an examiner hired by Floyd’s family contradicted those findings, claiming that Floyd did in fact die of asphyxiation.
That was the status of things prior to this week’s developments: we had a disturbing video without prior context, a bunch of assumptions, and not much more. And those assumptions were considered reason enough to burn our cities. The new footage does not necessarily clarify things — in fact, it does the opposite, adding complications and nuances to an issue that was once assumed to be utterly straightforward.
The body cameras worn by officers Alex Kueng and Thomas Lane, the first two cops on the scene, show Floyd agitated and uncooperative from the first moment that officers arrive in response to a call from a business owner who accused Floyd of trying to pass off counterfeit bills. Floyd is in his car when law enforcement first shows up. One of the officers draws his weapon because Floyd is initially hesitant to show his hands. Once Floyd places his hands on his head, the gun is holstered. After much coaxing, he is eventually removed from his car and taken over to the police cruiser.
Floyd appears to have trouble walking on his way over to the police car. He shouts “ow” and seems to be in pain even though he is only being grabbed by the arm. Once at the vehicle, he repeatedly refuses to get inside, saying that he’s “claustrophobic,” though he’d just been sitting in his own car without any apparent difficulty (on the contrary he was extremely reluctant to get out of his own vehicle). At one point, as officers try to convince him to get in the car, Floyd says he’d rather lay on the ground. He also says several times that he’s “going to die” and that he can’t breathe — all before he was on the ground. He ends up on the ground because he either falls or pushes himself out of the other side of the police cruiser as officers struggle to get him inside. From that point, the scene unfolds as we all saw on the initial video two months ago.
1. George Floyd was not fully cooperative and clearly intoxicated.
2. The officers were calm and reasonable for most of the interaction.
3. George Floyd claimed that he couldn’t breathe and was going to die well before he had a knee on his neck.
4. The officers never did or said a single thing that any reasonable person could construe as racist.
Point three in particular warrants further consideration.
Police misconduct, but nothing..NOTHING…that ever suggested racism. It’s was just cherry-picked like Trayvon and Brown because it was white on black.
That said, police have to follow rules, and the law.
#Floyd19
It is quite possible had law enforcement never been called, he might have eventually died on his own from the excessive level of drugs in his system. That being said, defense attorneys could argue his death was self inflicted.
George had what would have been a fatal sized dose of Fentynal (sp?) in his system at autopsy.
Perhaps if left alone that would have killed him that day anyway.
But addicts are always scheming how to get their next fix even while still high on their present fix.
Passing phony funny money was classic.
Constant lying throughout a police encounter also appears to be common as we also saw that during the police interview of Rayshard Brooks at the Wendy’s parking lot.
Haven’t two of the 4 police there when George Floyd died been exonerated and charges dropped for them???
Well… straightforward if you want to believe that racist cops is a systemic problem and they go around picking out random black guys and killing them… and Chauvin just got caught. Otherwise, what we continue to learn is what some of us suspected was the case all along; that Floyd put up a struggle which resulted in force being used to subdue him, which was likely excessive but complicated by Floyd’s drug use. NO, Chauvin and the others don’t get to walk because Floyd took drugs. NO, they don’t get to walk because Floyd resisted. BUT, there was never anything racial about it. NEVER. And that’s the key.
The racial aspect of this has been invented, and it was invented for the purpose of creating chaos, unrest and violence which the Democrats will tell us THEY can solve. They can’t; first, there is no solution to a problem that doesn’t exist, or isn’t nearly as bad as they would tell us and Democrats never solve anything… they CREATED the problem.
Oh, and to prevent the actual body cam of the actual incident from calming heightened emotion, people like ABC do all they can to keep tensions high.
https://newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/nicholas-fondacaro/2020/08/03/abc-spikes-leaked-video-floyd-arrest-cbsnbc-edit-out-stop
Yeah, well this is a lesson that should have been learned as far back as Trayvon Martin, but you learn, I guess, only the lessons you want to learn. It should be logical to anyone that has any consideration for human life to wait for facts before drawing harsh, racist conclusions that incite violence. The one and only reason to divert from that practice is if you WANT to incite violence.
The M.S. Media always hide the truth from us it never fails just how dishonest they are at the M.S. Media its no wonder their losing the trust of the American People
There’s a complete transcript of the Floyd/police encounter.
In it Floyd admits to carrying drugs as a mule INSIDE his rectum!
So, there’s some question as to whether he took the fatal dose on purpose or OD’ed because of that.
Police tell him he is foaming at the mouth, which is an OD or poisoning sign.
Floyd killed himself.
Perhaps if he’d gotten to an ER in time he might have pulled thru.
Look, I take no pleasure in this guy’s death or anything about his life that was tragic. He’s dead because he’s a serial criminal. Period.
@Nathan Blue:
Don’t forget these two things; there was a huge bust of counterfeit money in Minneapolis just months before the Floyd incident, and Floyd was a career criminal.
Why is anyone drug across the United States having multiple funerals and much cow towing by elected officials who was a career criminal?
Who Killed George Floyd?
@July 4th American:
I hate to break this to everyone, but Chauvin is to be a sacrificial lamb. There is no way he is going to be found not guilty of any charge. They might as well give him the pistol with one round in it right now.
I saw a business owner that was burned out on television yesterday and he is not rebuilding until after the trials; he doesn’t want to be burned out twice. Maybe he sees the facts and evidence and doubts Chauvin and the others will be convicted or he realizes that no matter what the outcome of the trial, the violent riots and looting are going to return… just, ‘cuz.