On Tuesday I published a post titled "It looks like George Floyd was not "murdered" after all". It cited an American Spectator article by a former federal and state prosecutor, George Parry, analyzing the toxicology report on the late Mr. Floyd. That article concluded that a drug overdose was the primary cause of Mr. Floyd's death, rather than flawed police intervention (which, let's face it, was indeed flawed, whether or not departmental policy was followed). A large number of reader comments kept the discussion going.
Now Mr. Parry has narrated a video by Fleming B. Fuller, analyzing all the available video footage of the incident involving Mr. Floyd, and letting the evidence speak for itself.
Tex contacted me and asked if I would agree to be interviewed as part of a documentary he was making about Mr. Floyd’s death. This and other interviews combined with a review of video evidence would comprise the film. I agreed, and a few days later Tex appeared at my front door with a camera and sound crew. The interview took a day, after which I waved goodbye to Tex and his merry band and awaited word on the progress of the project.
Then things took a surprising turn. Tex had decided to change the format. There would be no more interviews. Instead, the documentary would focus on the video taken at the scene by civilian witnesses, the body cameras worn by the police, and a surveillance camera at the location of the police interaction with Mr. Floyd. And here’s the surprise: I would narrate the documentary and analyze the video evidence and the results of Mr. Floyd’s autopsy and toxicology results.
So that’s how last month I came to be in a studio in Manhattan being wrung out dry as I blew one take after another in my first and definitely last effort at narrating a movie.
. . .
Who Killed George Floyd? runs 24 minutes, and parts of it are hard to watch. So heed the warning to viewers in the documentary and proceed accordingly.
There's more at the link.
Here's the video. In case the embedded version should cease to function, you'll find an alternative version on another platform here.
I highly recommend watching the video from beginning to end. It clears up a lot of the "smoke and mirrors" twisting of the news that we've seen from much of the mainstream media (not to mention propaganda from the progressive left of US politics).
I continue to believe, based on all the evidence in the public domain that I've seen, that Mr. Floyd's arrest was mishandled by the officers involved, and that they used procedures that, at best, pose an unnecessarily high risk of injury to the suspect. I say this as one trained to some extent in such procedures, as part of my service as a prison chaplain. In the federal prison system all staff, irrespective of our job titles (including chaplains), had to learn to restrain and immobilize violent inmates, because we were all too likely to encounter them during the course of our duties. We were initially trained at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) in Brunswick, Georgia, and later during annual refresher training at our institutions. I'm here to tell you, that restraint training came in handy sometimes!
I recall that we were specifically warned not to use restraining techniques or "holds" that might impair the subject's breathing or circulation, due to potential negative consequences (both physical, to the inmate, and legal, to the Bureau of Prisons). That emphasis doesn't appear to have been included in the policies or training provided by the Minneapolis Police Department, which apparently specifically authorized and taught officers to kneel on the subject's chest, back or neck if necessary in order to obtain compliance. In this case, as pointed out by friend and fellow blogger (and experienced paramedic) Jeff B. in comments to the previous article, that may have aggravated Mr. Floyd's already impaired condition.
Nevertheless, I think the toxicology evidence conclusively demonstrates that the conduct of the law enforcement officers concerned was only one factor, and potentially a minor factor, in Mr. Floyd's death. Watch the video, read the earlier article, and judge for yourselves.
Peter
7 comments:
I knew from the start that GF was a criminal drug addled sack of human waste that deserved to die. The cops were clearly trying to handle him so he would not get in his vehicle and possibly kill or maim other people. GF could have died in custody a few hours later with the drugs in his system.
A few points:
1. I've seen other videos of Floyd being led around the rear of his sister's Mercedes where he appears to discard some drugs (little white baggies), apparently unnoticed by the police. Not mentioned here, and I haven't seen much made of it, but you can see them lying on the ground behind the car in this video.
2. It would be helpful if the fentanyl information was bracketed. OK, 3 ng/ml is the minimum lethal dose. Presumably that's for a small non-drug using person. What is the maximum survivable dose, for a larger habitual user? That's an important piece of information that is missing if we are to conclude reasonably that it's an OD death. If fentanyl is a synthetic opioid, then would a habitual user develop a tolerance for it?
3. What about the 'hooping'? What any evidence of this found during the autopsy? Is there a way to check for it, localized residual drug levels or some other observation?
There's still quite a bit unanswered, and hopefully justice will be done. I agree that the arrest was handled poorly but the officers don't appear to have done anything illegal that would warrant the charges.
Isn't bending over someone and pressing your knee against their neck a violation of the 6-foot minimum "social distancing" rule?
Do I understand it right, George Floyd was a dead man walking when he 'hooped' unless an EMT with Naloxone could have reached him in time?
And that the restraining method may be bad, but was what was prescribed by the police department and trained into the cops?
So in other words, absolutely nothing the cops did was against the law?
Well, in that case, fine the DA's that withheld the evidence for the total costs of the riots.
And prosecute them for x cases of negligent homicide (x being the number of people killed in the riots).
We toldja so at the time, but we repeat for emphasis:
George Floyd died in police custody;
he was not killed in police custody, no matter how much the video of the arrest pisses anyone off, nor whether or not it was in policy or not.
Yuuuuuuuuuuuge difference.
And Captain Obvious notes that there will be a shortage of crow nationwide when reality dawns in a widespread fashion.
@Aggie,
Bigger question:
Was it fentanyl (pharmacy grade) or the far more prevalent carfentanil (homebrew synthetic crap), which has an LD50 equivalent to about three grains of salt (which makes it about as lethal as Sarin or VX)?
BTW, for one and all, the tip-off in that (or any other) video is that anyone saying "I can't breathe" obviously can.
Vocal cords don't work if no air is being exchanged.
Physiology FTW.
From decades in the ER, I can also state authoritatively that people who really can't breathe, aren't talking.
Trust me on this.
I am confident that given a month or two of contempation, video watching, planning, a few training rehearsals, and given the same exact situation, that a flawless containment and arrest could be performed by most. Maybe. Of course if the mayor proclaims them murderers anyway, with no investigation, and the state hides evidence that exonerates them, it wouldn't matter.
"Here lies George Johnsow, hanged by Mistake, 1882, He was right, we was wrong But we strung him up and now he's gone." That's what this was, a social justice lynching with much less honesty. No rope needed.
I hope rule of law prevails, and these political prisoners are exonerated and they proceed to win millions in lawsuits. I would be nice if others were indicted and imprisoned for hiding and misrepresenting evidence.
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