Judge DENIES defense request to acquit Derek Chauvin in George Floyd's death

all right we are on the record uh to have several issues take care of this morning first and foremost is the defense motion for judgment of acquittal mr nelson thank you your honor your honor um pursuant to our discussions yesterday uh in terms of the timeliness of this motion um at this point the defense moves pursuant to minnesota rule of criminal procedure 26.03 subdivision 18 for n1 for a judgment of acquittal in this particular case i'm sure that the court is very familiar with the legal standards applicable in this case court needs to view the evidence as presented in the light most favorable to the state at this point your honor the defense submits that the state has failed to present sufficient evidence even in the light most favorable to the state to establish uh two of the principal issues or uh arguments in this particular case the use of force and whether the use of force was reasonable as well as the cause of death of mr floyd starting first and foremost with the use of force what the state has essentially done is provided six different opinions from various police officers or use of force experts all of which seem to contradict themselves or each other for example sergeant plugger testified uh and sergeant plugger and jody steiger i would say are the only two have who have had a consistent opinion that the use of force became unreasonable at a point that mr floyd ceased struggling um mr zimmerman or lieutenant zimmerman had the opinion that even at the point of sorry uh even at the point uh that the force became unreasonable use of force became unreasonable when mr floyd was handcuffed chief aerodondo i think approached it from a different perspective because that was more of a civil employment standard and it was a violation of mpd policy versus a real statement in terms of the use of force ultimately the two experts that the state has presented jody steiger and seth stouten are too they even disagreed with each other so you have a myriad of inconsistent complicated uh uses of force use of force opinions that really demonstrate the difficulty of establishing beyond a reasonable doubt that the use of force was objectively unreasonable which is the standard under graham versus connor well they all ultimately said it was objectively unreasonable at some point the question is is when is when did it become and we have again six or seven different opinions on that in addition your honor in terms of the medical evidence you again have as the court is aware the cause of death it has to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt you have the testimony of doctors tobin dr rich and dr smock who ultimately testified as to and dr lindsey thomas those four doctors ultimately concluded that it was an asphyxial death however the state likewise presented dr baker's testimony which in large part while he declared it a homicide for medical purposes which is not a statement of criminal obligations but the criminal standard dr baker suggested something much different which was that mr floyd's heart simply couldn't handle the stress uh of the circumstances um so your honor you the state has essentially introduced doubt in the context of providing multiple opinions from multiple experts all of which seem to contradict each other and for that reason we would ask the state to or excuse me ask the court to grant the motion for judgment of a quote right for the state thank you your honor the state opposes the defendant's motion for a judgment of acquittal that evidence taken to the light most favorable to the state as we've presented it uh establishes all of the elements of all of the crimes charged and negates the defense of reasonable use of force the issue is not whether there are inconsistencies minor inconsistencies and what witnesses say the issue is whether taken as a whole the state has proved its case in terms of the force analysis a reasonable force there's no question that the witnesses who have testified have all opined that the defendant's force was objectively unreasonable he was not trained to do this by the minneapolis police department he did not follow policy he did not follow procedure and the force that he exercised was unnecessary under the circumstances and simply continued on too long as to the medical causation issue your honor the state has introduced evidence that if believed by a reasonable jury clearly established that the defendant's conduct was a causal factor in bringing about mr floyd's death through the pulmonologists or dr baker through the other witnesses who've testified and so taken as a whole the state believes that it's established and will establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty of all charges thank you i'm going to deny the defense motion for judgment of acquittal i would note the standard unlike a jury which has to decide uh whether the case has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt and in doing so must presume the defendant innocent the court's duty at this point is to look at the evidence in the light most favorable to the state and even when there are inconsistencies inconsistencies major or minor between witnesses the jury is free to believe some and not the others and when viewing a set of facts in the light most favorable to the state they could give their greatest weight to those witnesses who establish that the use of force was reason unreasonable and that the cause of death uh was positional asphyxia or lack of oxygen however the state wishes to characterize it but most importantly that it was caused by the defendant that is viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the state it is clear that that has been established and so based on that standard the most for judgment acquittal is denied

Channel: The Hill

Views: 1,023,789

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Id: eOwf6gBaOrM

Length: 6min 47sec (407 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 14 2021