Decision On Additional Charges For George Floyd’s Death To Be Announced

Minnesota’s Attorney General’s office is expected to announce their decision on filing additional charges on George Floyd’s death, Wednesday.

The New York Post reported that the AG’s office had finished the investigation surrounding George Floyd’s death and AG Keith Ellison had reached a decision on whether or not additional charges should be filed against former Minneapolis cop Derek Chauvin.

In a CNN report, two officials who were briefed on the matter didn’t reveal what was decided.

Chauvin is currently facing charges of third degree murder and second degree manslaughter.

Meanwhile, Floyd’s family has called for the charges against Chauvin to be upgraded and for charges to be filed against Thomas Lane, J.A. Kueng and Tou Thao, the three other cops who were present during the incident.

All four of the officers involved were fired but only Chauvin was charged.

Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo said in a CNN report that Lane, Kueng and Thao’s silence made them complicit to the crime.

"Silence and inaction, you're complicit. You're complicit," he added. "If there were one solitary voice that would have intervened and acted, that's what I would have hoped for."

CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig said that while Chauvin’s charges could be easily spotted in his actions in the video, Lane, Kueng and Thao’s inaction would require thorough examination and analysis to determine the charges that could be filed against them.

“The key questions are what did each officer see and hear, and what id each officer physically do and say,” he said. “You have to be able to recreate that moment by moment in order to determine whether they’re criminally liable.”

He added that if the three officers are charged, it would likely be on charges of aiding and abetting which means that if someone helped assist, counsel or facilitate somebody else in committing a crime, then they are liable for that crime as well.

According to a CNN report, while the video showed some instances of Lane and Kuen speaking up, they still did not proactively prevent Chauvin from relieving Floyd from being pinned down in the position which would lead to his death.

Ben Crump, the Floyd family’s attorney, said that the autopsy showed that each of the officers should be arrested.

“Mr. Floyd’s death was a homicide by officers who taunted him while holding him down for more than eight minutes,” he said. “And the officer who stood by doing nothing was a physical shield; a living symbol of the code of silence.”

Floyd’s independent autopsy report showed that he died of “asphyxiation from sustained pressure” which was caused by the lack of blood flow to his brain due to the compression on his neck and back.