There have been many reports of how George Floyd may have had a heated past with Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who pressed his knee on Floyd's neck for nearly nine minutes. According to a former co-worker of Floyd’s, David Pinney, the two allegedly clashed over Chauvin’s “aggressive” treatment of customers at the nightclub where Floyd worked security.

Pinney worked with Floyd at the El Nuevo Rodeo nightclub in Minneapolis. Chauvin was, for a time, also paid to sit outside the club in his squad car while off-duty, in an effort to provide extra security.

“They bumped heads,” Pinney said during a recent CBS special, “Justice for All.” “It has a lot to do with Derek being extremely aggressive within the club with some of the patrons, which was an issue.”

Pinney then affirmed that Floyd and Chauvin almost certainly knew one another, adding that he believed they knew each other “pretty well.”

Maya Santamaria, owner of the club, said that, based on her encounters with Chauvin, the only part of his treatment of Floyd that surprised her was how far he went.

“I was not surprised when I initially saw his knee on his neck, to be honest,” Santamaria said. “Because I’ve seen Chauvin do stuff along those lines. What surprised me was that he didn’t stop right away once George was obviously, ya know, saying, ‘OK, OK.’”

Santamaria also agreed when an interviewer asked her if Chauvin had issues with black people. In her estimation, the former police officer “was afraid and intimidated” by them.

Third-degree murder charges dismissed for former police officer Derek Chauvin, an arresting officer in the George Floyd case in Minneapolis.
Former police officer Derek Chauvin appeared by videolink in Minneapolis court for the murder of African American George Floyd, whose May 25 death sparked massive protests across the United States Hennepin County Jail / Handout
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