Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin will not be given a new trial following his murder conviction for the killing of George Floyd, an appeals court has ruled.
Mr Floyd, 46, died in 2020 after Chauvin pinned him to the ground with a knee on his neck. The killing sparked protests in Minneapolis and around the globe over racial injustice.
Chauvin was convicted of state murder and manslaughter charges in 2021 and is currently serving 22-and-a-half years in jail.
His attorney had asked the appeals court to throw out the ex-officer’s convictions after claiming that legal and procedural errors deprived him of a fair trial.
However, the Minnesota Court of Appeals has upheld the murder conviction.
Chauvin’s attorney, William Mohrman, argued on appeal that the trial judge should have moved the case out of Minneapolis because of extensive pretrial publicity and unprecedented security precautions due to fears of violence.
“The primary issue on this appeal is whether a criminal defendant can get a fair trial consistent with constitutional requirements in a courthouse surrounded by concrete block, barbed wire, two armored personnel carriers, and a squad of National Guard troops, all of which or whom are there for one purpose: in the event that the jury acquits the defendant,” Mr Mohrman said in oral arguments in January.
But Neal Katyal, a special attorney for the state, argued that Chauvin got “one of the most transparent and thorough trials in our nation’s history. ... Chauvin’s many arguments before this court do not come close to justifying reversal.”
Hennepin County Judge Peter Cahill sentenced Chauvin to 22 and-a-half years after jurors found him guilty of second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
Chauvin later pleaded guilty to a separate federal civil rights charge and was sentenced to 21 years in federal prison, which he is now serving in Arizona concurrent with his state sentence.
“Judge Cahill managed this trial with enormous care, and even if Chauvin could identify some minor fault, any error is harmless,” Mr Katyal said. “The evidence of Chauvin’s guilt was captured on video for the world to see.”
Mr Mohrman argued in his brief that the pretrial publicity was the most extensive of any trial in Minnesota history, and that the judge should have moved the trial and sequestered the jury.
Mr Mohrman wrote that the publicity and the riots, the city’s $27 million settlement with Floyd’s family announced during jury selection, the unrest over a police killing of a Black man in a Minneapolis suburb during jury selection, and the sealing off of the courthouse were just some of the factors prejudicing Chauvin’s chance of a fair trial.
His appeal also focused on one juror who participated in a civil rights event commemorating Martin Luther King Jr.’s March on Washington, a few months after Mr Floyd’s death. Only after the trial did the juror reveal that he had been there.
The juror was questioned during selection about whether he had participated in any demonstrations or marches “in Minneapolis” against police brutality after Mr Floyd’s death. But Chauvin’s original attorney, Eric Nelson, did not ask whether he had participated in any marches elsewhere.
Mr Mohrman argued that Judge Cahill should have held a hearing after the revelation to determine whether the juror’s nondisclosure constituted misconduct. He said the appeals court should send the case back to the judge for a hearing on that issue — a request that he had denied.
Other disputes in the appeal included whether it was legally permissible to convict Chauvin of third-degree murder, given a 2021 Minnesota Supreme Court decision clarifying the definition of that crime, and whether Judge Cahill was justified in exceeding the 12 1/2 years recommended under the state’s sentencing guidelines.
