Officer who pressed knee into George Floyd’s neck found guilty of murder

The former Minneapolis (US) police officer who pressed his knee into George Floyd’s neck until well past Floyd’s final breath, was found guilty of murder on Tuesday in a case that drew millions into the streets for the largest racial justice protests in generations.

The verdict could send the former officer, Derek Chauvin, to prison for decades.

For Americans, it was a rare rebuke of police violence, following case after case of officers going without charges or convictions after killing black men, women and children.

The video, taken by a teenage girl, showed Chauvin, who is white, kneeling on the neck of Floyd, who was black, for nine minutes and 29 seconds as Floyd pleaded for his life and bystanders tried to intervene. Floyd repeated “I can’t breathe” more than 20 times during the encounter.

The video stirred Americans of all races to gather for mass protests, chanting “Black lives matter” and challenging the country to finally have a true reckoning over race.

Over the course of two days, a racially diverse jury of seven women and five men deliberated for about 10 hours before pronouncing Derek Chauvin guilty on all three charges: second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

US President Joe Biden praised the verdict in a nationwide address at the White House but called it a “too rare” step to deliver “basic accountability” for Black Americans.

“It was a murder in full light of day, and it ripped the blinders off for the whole world to see,” Biden said. “For so many, it feels like it took all of that for the judicial system to deliver just basic accountability.”

After the verdict, Philonise Floyd, one of Floyd’s younger brothers, spoke at the Hilton hotel in downtown Minneapolis. “We are able to breathe again,” he said, holding back tears.

He drew a line from his brother back to Emmett Till, a black child who was lynched in Mississippi in 1955. “We ought to always understand that we have to march,” he said. “We will have to do this for life. We have to protest because it seems like this is a never-ending cycle.”

People gathered at the intersection where Floyd was killed, now known as George Floyd Square, and the word “Guilty” rippled throughout the crowd after the verdict was announced, prompting cheers and sobs. The crowd began to chant, “Black lives matter.”

Chauvin, who had been free on bail during the trial, was ordered into custody by the judge, and was taken out of the courtroom in handcuffs.