Four former Minneapolis police officers, including Derek Chauvin, have been indicted on civil rights charges over the death of George Floyd.
The Justice Department said Friday a grand jury indictment charged Chauvin, who was convicted on murder charges after kneeling on Floyd's neck for over nine minutes during an arrest, with depriving Floyd of his constitutional right "to be free from the use of unreasonable force by a police officer."
Former Minneapolis officers Tou Thao, J. Alexander Kueng, and Thomas Lane were also charged for their roles in Floyd's death. Prosecutors said Thao and Kueng were charged with having "willfully failed to intervene to stop Chauvin's use of unreasonable force," and the indictment said all four defendants "willfully failed to aid" Floyd despite seeing him in need of medical attention, thereby depriving him of "his constitutional right not to be deprived of liberty without due process of law."
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Separately, Chauvin was also indicted on civil rights charges stemming from a 2017 incident, in which prosecutors said he held a Minneapolis teenager "by the throat and struck the teenager multiple times in the head with a flashlight."
These new charges, The New York Times noted, are separate both from state charges Thao, Kueng, and Lane previously faced, as well as separate from a civil investigation the Department of Justice has opened into the Minneapolis Police Department. Attorney General Merrick Garland last month said this probe would examine whether the department "engages in a pattern or practice of unconstitutional or unlawful policing."
