MINNESOTA, US May 2 -The police officer who held community members back during the May 2020 killing of George Floyd was on Monday found guilty of aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter.
Minnesota’s Judge Peter Cahill in a 177-page verdict wrote that the officer, Tou Thao “actively encouraged his three colleagues’ dangerous prone restraint of Floyd” contrary to his training that the positioning could cause fatal asphyxia.
Judge Cahill said Thao, like the bystanders, could see Floyd’s life slowly ebbing away as the restraint continued.
“Yet Thao made a conscious decision to actively participate in Floyd’s death: he held back the concerned bystanders and even prevented an off-duty Minneapolis firefighter from rendering the medical aid Floyd so desperately needed,” the judge wrote in his verdict.
The killing that sparked worldwide protests objecting to police violence against black people, was captured on video
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison termed the conviction historic and the right outcome, saying it brings one more measure of accountability in the tragic death of Floyd.
“Accountability is not justice, but it is a step on the road to justice,” he said.
The conviction comes three years after Derek Chauvin, Thomas Lane, J. Alexander Kueng and Thao were fired and arrested for their actions –or lack thereof – in May 2020 as Chauvin pressed his knee into the neck and back of Floyd, for more than nine minutes.
During the incident, Thao was standing nearby and ordered concerned residents not to interfere with police.
During his federal trial in 2022, Thao testified that he assumed the other officers at the scene were “taking care” of Floyd, and that he resorted to crowd and traffic control.
Chauvin was found guilty of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in state court and was sentenced to 22 and a half years in prison in June 2021.
He was also convicted of depriving Floyd of his rights and an unrelated civil rights violation and was sentenced to 21 years in prison.
He is serving the sentences concurrently.
Lane, Kueng and Thao were found guilty in federal court of violating Floyd’s civil rights and of failing to intervene to stop Chauvin during the restraint.
Thao is already serving a three-and-a- half-year sentence for his February 2022 conviction.
Officer Thao will be sentenced on August 7. According to state guidelines, he could be sentenced to between 41 and 57 months in prison.
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