Chauvin Murder Trial

[The Grand Nudger]

Floyd wasn't on trial, he died in the street an innocent man at the hands of a police officer while fully restrained.  Chauvin was, for causing the death of a man through extreme recklessness while committing assault.

Personally, I think they could have got him for murder int he first but perhaps the prosecutor knows better, eh, and judging by some of the responses just on these boards....well.  If there are people willing to accept that he did exactly what he was charged with and still believe that he was innocent of the charges, then there wouldn't be much point in going for a greater charge no matter what the evidence suggested.

I wasn't saying he was. I was saying his violent past would have contributed to the disproportionate response and that this should not be discounted.
All factors need to be considered when deciding the degree guilt. We can dislike the act, we can dislike the person but the reaction must be proportionate to the circumstances and what we know of both men.

They weren't initially going to press for second, I don't think they thought they could get it at first and given the wiggle room afforded to the defense by the circumstances I can't say I blame them. 
Public opinion definitely played a role. The jury and witnesses were not sequestered, public officials were dishing out guilt like it was in fashion and the use of force experts old house was smeared in pigs blood and had a pigs head laid outside it. 

Regardless of whether it was the right verdict or not this was a horrendously tainted trial. We can definitely expect a retrial at some point when things cool down. I imagine the defense probably knew that, infact the judge told him as much at one point.

It did, and they were pretty damned brutal in restraining him.  Chauvin committed the crime for which he was charged and convicted -after- Floyd was fully restrained. Public opinion and tainted juries played absolutely no role in what chauvin did, for ten minutes, on video, in front of everyone's lying eyes. He committed the crimes for which he was charged and convicted -at least. IMO, it was more than that, but hey, whatevs, it's nice when the bad man does the bad shit on tape, right? You think that being a bad guy needs to be counted in when it comes to floyd...fine, same with chauvin.

He was committing assault, and through his extreme recklessness, caused a mans death. Those were the charges, that was the conviction. If you want to insist that taint played a part in convicting him for exactly what he did on camera, you could at least explain how, rather than waving at some boogeyman. I'm a friendly audience for it - I'm pretty much always critical of law enforcement and convictions. I'm even critical of this one, though not for any of the reasons bouncing around on social media. I think his buddies in blue fed him to the wolves to save their own asses. That, ofc, has no bearing on what he did...on tape........to a fully restrained man...who died.