1. Derek Michael Chauvin is an American former police officer who murdered George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
47 Facts About Derek Chauvin
1. 2.
In early 2021, Derek Chauvin was put on trial for unintentional second-degree murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter and convicted on all of the charges.
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Derek Chauvin's conviction was notable as it was one of a number of high profile police deaths of African Americans in custody but only one of a few where a police officer was convicted.
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Derek Chauvin's mother was a housewife and his father was a certified public accountant.
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Derek Chauvin attended Park High School in Cottage Grove, Minnesota, but did not finish and later obtained a GED certificate in 1994.
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Derek Chauvin earned a certificate in quantity food preparation at Dakota County Technical College and worked jobs as a prep cook at a McDonald's in Cottage Grove and later at a Tinucci's buffet restaurant in neighboring Newport.
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Derek Chauvin served in the United States Army Reserve from 1996 to 2004, including two stints in the military police between 1996 and 2000.
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Derek Chauvin applied to the Minneapolis Police Department in September 2000 and joined the MPD in 2001.
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Derek Chauvin received a medal for valor in 2006 for being one of several officers who fired 23 shots on Wayne Reyes who pointed a shotgun at them, and another in 2008 for a domestic violence incident in which he broke down a door and shot Ira Latrell Toles who reached for Chauvin's gun, according to police.
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Derek Chauvin received a commendation medal in 2008 after he and his partner tackled a fleeing suspect holding a pistol.
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In 2009, Derek Chauvin received another commendation medal after working off duty as a security guard for a nightclub.
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Derek Chauvin had 18 complaints on his official record, two of which ended in discipline, specifically letters of reprimand.
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On October 29,2006, Derek Chauvin was one of a group of six officers who opened fire on Wayne Reyes, shooting 43 rounds in four seconds, killing him.
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On May 24,2008, Derek Chauvin was responding to a domestic violence call about 21-year-old Black man Ira Latrell Toles by the mother of his child.
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Police reports stated that Toles reached for an officer's gun and then Derek Chauvin shot him twice in the stomach.
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On September 4,2017, Derek Chauvin was among officers responding to a complaint by the mother of two young children.
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Videos from the scene were said to show Derek Chauvin hitting a 14-year-old Black boy in the head with a flashlight so hard he required stitches, then holding him down with his knee for nearly 17 minutes, ignoring the boy's complaints that he could not breathe.
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On May 25,2020, Derek Chauvin was one of four officers involved in arresting George Floyd on suspicion of using a counterfeit $20 bill at a market and was the field training officer for one of the other officers involved.
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Derek Chauvin was released on conditional bail on October 7,2020, after posting a bond of $1 million.
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However, on January 13,2021, Judge Cahill reversed his earlier ruling, deciding that Derek Chauvin would be tried separately from the other three officers.
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Derek Chauvin's trial began on March 8,2021, at the Hennepin County Government Center.
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Derek Chauvin was the first White Minnesotan police officer to be convicted of murdering a Black person.
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Derek Chauvin appealed his second-degree murder conviction and requested a public defender to represent him on appeal.
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Derek Chauvin asked the Minnesota Supreme Court to review the case, but was denied in July 2023.
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Derek Chauvin's lawyer asked the Supreme Court of the United States to review the case.
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Derek Chauvin was then booked into the Oak Park Heights prison, where he had been incarcerated following his 2020 arrest.
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At Oak Parks, Derek Chauvin was held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day in an isolated wing of the prison, where he was under constant watch "for fears for his safety".
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Derek Chauvin was held at Oak Park Heights until his sentencing hearing on June 25,2021.
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On May 12,2021, Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill allowed for the prosecution to seek a greater prison sentence after finding that Derek Chauvin treated Floyd "with particular cruelty".
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State prosecutors sought a sentence of 30 years' imprisonment for Derek Chauvin based on the extreme cruelty he exhibited when he murdered Floyd, which "shocked the conscience".
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The earliest Derek Chauvin could be eligible for release on parole would be in 2035 or 2036, when he will be close to 60 years old.
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Derek Chauvin was later transferred to FCI Big Spring, a low-security prison in Texas, after being stabbed.
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The United States Department of Justice convened a grand jury in February 2021 to investigate whether Derek Chauvin violated Floyd's civil rights as well as another incident in September 2017 when Derek Chauvin restrained a 14-year-old boy for several minutes, using his knee to lean into the boy's back and hitting him with a flashlight several times.
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The federal charges were to be prosecuted by Justice Department attorneys in Minnesota and Washington, DC On September 16,2021, Derek Chauvin pleaded not guilty to the charges related to the 2017 incident indictment.
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Three months after initially entering a plea of not guilty to the federal charges, Derek Chauvin requested a hearing to offer a revised plea.
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On December 15,2021, Derek Chauvin pleaded guilty to the federal charges of violating the rights of Floyd and to violating the rights of the 14-year-old boy in the 2017 incident.
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Derek Chauvin admitted for the first time that he willfully violated Floyd's constitutional right to be free from unreasonable seizure, which includes the right to be free from the use of unreasonable force by a police officer, by continuously kneeling on Floyd's neck even though Floyd was handcuffed and not resisting at the time.
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Derek Chauvin admitted willfully violating Floyd's constitutional right not to be deprived of liberty without due process of law, including the right to be free from a police officer's deliberate indifference to Floyd's serious medical needs.
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Derek Chauvin admitted that his knee had remained on Floyd's neck even after Floyd became unresponsive.
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On July 7,2022, Derek Chauvin was sentenced to 21 years in prison on the charges of violating the civil rights of George Floyd and the boy.
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Derek Chauvin filed a motion in federal court in mid-November 2023 attempting to vacate the civil rights conviction.
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Derek Chauvin first appeared in Washington County District Court for his tax-evasion case on September 8,2021.
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Derek Chauvin pleaded guilty on March 17,2023, and was sentenced to 13 months in prison, to run concurrently with his murder sentence with credit given for time already served.
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Prison employees performed "life-saving" measures on Derek Chauvin who suffered serious bodily injury and was taken to a hospital for further evaluation and treatment.
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The stabbing attack on Derek Chauvin was compared to the July 2023 prison assault on Larry Nassar and it raised further scrutiny of inmate safety in the federal prison system.
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Derek Chauvin's ex-wife is a real-estate agent and photographer, a Hmong refugee from Laos, and the winner of the 2018 "Mrs Minnesota" beauty pageant.
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Derek Chauvin filed for divorce the day before Chauvin was arrested for Floyd's murder, and the divorce was finalized in February 2021.