UPDATED: Chauvin Found Guilty of 2 Murder Counts, 1 Other

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Disgraced former police officer Derek Chauvin at his murder trial.

Derek Chauvin has just been found guilty on all three counts, including the murder of George Floyd.  More to come.

I don’t know what happening elsewhere in OC, but here near the Brea-La Habra border there was a sudden burst of honking car horns — nice to hear.

UPDATE, April 21: Hat tip to Alternet, which pointed me to this document, the police statement issued shortly after the death of George Floyd, which is so off the mark it makes one wonder how it could be done by anyone who had expected the slightest oversight:

On Monday evening, shortly after 8:00 pm, officers from the Minneapolis Police Department responded to the 3700 block of Chicago Avenue South on a report of a forgery in progress. Officers were advised that the suspect was sitting on top of a blue car and appeared to be under the influence.

Two officers arrived and located the suspect, a male believed to be in his 40s, in his car. He was ordered to step from his car. After he got out, he physically resisted officers. Officers were able to get the suspect into handcuffs and noted he appeared to be suffering medical distress. Officers called for an ambulance. He was transported to Hennepin County Medical Center by ambulance where he died a short time later.

At no time were weapons of any type used by anyone involved in this incident.

The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has been called in to investigate this incident at the request of the Minneapolis Police Department.

No officers were injured in the incident.

Body worn cameras were on and activated during this incident.

The brazen distortion here is not surprising, but it is — though less literally than the actual facts of what happened that night — completely breathtaking.  And that is a big part of what is left to fight — and why we should that thankful that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz took the investigation away from the local district attorney and handed it to the state’s Attorney General, Keith Ellison.

The New York Times had some interesting opinion columns about this yesterday.  Writing about them will take a while, so I’ll probably put them in a separate post if and when I do.

About Greg Diamond

Somewhat verbose attorney, semi-disabled and semi-retired, residing in northwest Brea. Occasionally ran for office against jerks who otherwise would have gonr unopposed. Got 45% of the vote against Bob Huff for State Senate in 2012; Josh Newman then won the seat in 2016. In 2014 became the first attorney to challenge OCDA Tony Rackauckas since 2002; Todd Spitzer then won that seat in 2018. Every time he's run against some rotten incumbent, the *next* person to challenge them wins! He's OK with that. Corrupt party hacks hate him. He's OK with that too. He does advise some local campaigns informally and (so far) without compensation. (If that last bit changes, he will declare the interest.) His daughter is a professional campaign treasurer. He doesn't usually know whom she and her firm represent. Whether they do so never influences his endorsements or coverage. (He does have his own strong opinions.) But when he does check campaign finance forms, he is often happily surprised to learn that good candidates he respects often DO hire her firm. (Maybe bad ones are scared off by his relationship with her, but they needn't be.)