Latest news with #DerekChauvin
BBC News
07-06-2025
- BBC News
Colston statue toppling shows 'history isn't static'
For hundreds of years, Edward Colston was celebrated and honoured by many in his home city of Bristol, but an anti-racism protest held in the city on 7 June 2020 changed that in the most dramatic way. The toppling of his statue five years ago today made headlines around the world, forcing Bristolians to examine the legacy of the 17th Century slave years, his prominence in Bristol in the form of the city-centre statue and multiple locations bearing his name sparked controversy. Born into a merchant's family, Colston went on to build his own business in London trading in slaves, cloth, wine and found wealth through his work and later became an official of the Royal African Company, which held the monopoly in Britain on slave is believed to have transported about 80,000 men, women and children from Africa to the Americas between 1672 and 1689. When Colston died in 1721, he left his wealth to churches and hospitals in Bristol. A portion of it was also used in founding two almshouses and a legacy continued to live on, with his name and face appearing on various city streets, buildings and memorials. The beginning of the end for Colston's close relationship with Bristol began thousands of miles away in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on 25 May, were called to a grocery store to reports of a 46-year-old man allegedly paying for a pack of cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill. That man was George police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Mr Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes during his arrest. Mr Floyd's pleas of "I can't breathe" as he died sent shock waves around the world - including towards Lives Matter protests sprung up across the world, calling for an end to racism and police Floyd: What happened in the final moments of his lifeChauvin was convicted of Mr Floyd's murder along with three other officers - Tou Thao, Thomas Lane and J Alexander Kueng - who were convicted of aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter. The Black Lives Matter protest in Bristol attracted an estimated 15,000 people who gathered on College Green before heading down to Colston Avenue, where the bronze statue was erected in honour of the slave trader in 1895. On the day of the protest, the figure was covered up with a canvas material. It had already been targeted by egg-throwers, but the canvas was later torn off by protesters saying they wanted to look Colston in the eyes. Shortly after the cloth was removed, three protesters climbed up to the statue and attached ropes to its head. To roars of celebration from the crowd, they pulled on the ropes and 30 seconds later the statue was on the ground. Many ran towards the fallen figure, jumping on it and kicking it. One protester placed his knee on the statue's neck, mirroring the actions of Chauvin during Mr Floyd's arrest. Other protesters climbed the empty plinth, chanting and holding anti-racism statue was later dragged the short distance over to the harbour, where it was dumped into the water. For many that was symbolic, as Bristol's waterways had plenty of links with the slave people - dubbed the Colston Four - were charged for their involvement in the toppling, but were later acquitted of criminal damage. The toppling of the statue was dramatic. Other change has been slower, but over the last five years, Colston's name has gradually started disappearing from the city. In fact three years before his statue was toppled, the city's largest music venue, Bristol Beacon - known formerly as Colston Hall - announced that it was considering dropping the link to Colston. Massive Attack, perhaps the most famous band from Bristol, had always refused to play the venue due to its name change proposal led to a debate, with bosses maintaining that the venue was named after the street it is located on, rather than the slave trader. There was no investment from Colston in building the of Bristolians were against the change, it should be noted, but on 23 September 2020, the Bristol Music Trust, which runs the venue, decided to go ahead with the schools in Bristol also implemented changes after the statue came School in Stapleton became known as Collegiate School, Colston's Girls' School became Montpelier High School and The Dolphin Primary School changed its logo from the Colston family crest. Karen Macdonald, head of public engagement on Bristol City Council's culture team, said the toppling was "symbolic".The statue was temporarily displayed at the M Shed museum in the city in 2021 after it was retrieved from the harbour. The council launched a public survey which more than 14,000 Bristolians responded to with "very clear wishes" of what they wanted for the statue's future. The majority of the responses called for the statue to be displayed in its damaged state, alongside balanced historical information and context about Colston's that is where you will find the Colston statue now, lying on its back in a glass case, surrounded by the real placards left behind by the protestors. Ms Macdonald said: "There is value in listening to different viewpoints and coming to an understanding, even if you can't agree with each other. "This isn't erasing history, this is recording history. History isn't something that can remain static and preserved - that moment was history in action. "It wasn't about lumps of cast metal," she added. Nothing has replaced the toppled statue, the plinth is still it does now feature an updated plaque reflecting Colston's involvement in slavery and telling the story of that dramatic day in June.
Fox News
05-06-2025
- Business
- Fox News
Minneapolis business owner 'feels bad' for the cops, blames city for violence that hurt his livelihood
EXCLUSIVE - Edwin Reed was emotional when describing what his Minneapolis business has endured in the five years since George Floyd's death, largely blaming the city. "It's been a heck of a roller coaster these last five years," Edwin Reed told Fox News Digital. Reed owns Sincere Detailing Pros at 38th and Chicago in south Minneapolis, which happens to be right near where George Floyd, a Black man, was killed five years ago when White former police officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee on Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes, asphyxiating him, after Floyd was allegedly caught using a counterfeit $20 bill to buy cigarettes. Floyd's death caused riots throughout the city of Minneapolis and the country, and Chauvin was sentenced to 21 years for violating Floyd's civil rights and 22.5 years for second-degree murder. A month after Floyd's death in May 2020, Reed said barricades were erected on all corners of the neighborhood that proved to be a huge hit to his revenue. "I mean, like wherever you turn, wherever you go, there was a barricade about maybe six feet high," he recalled. "And they were each about maybe 5-6,000 pounds apiece. And it drove our customers away." George Floyd Square, which served as a way to remember Floyd, quickly devolved into a danger zone, Reed said. "Tens of thousands of people a week were coming here before they found out that when they came, they were getting robbed by vigilantes that were hanging out here, different gangs, rival gangs… because they knew that there was no police protection within this block radius," Reed said. "So, it was just like a walk in the park for these people to just rob." Reed said he changed the hours of his company because his customers were scared and calling him because they were worried about their cars "being jacked." Several people died from gunfire in George Floyd Square amid the unrest, and Reed said he personally saw six people get killed, two of whom he tried to resuscitate. He went further to allege that the ambulance refused to come in when they called 911, and sometimes "they didn't even answer the phone." A city spokesperson said the Minneapolis Police Department provides 24/7 service to the 38th and Chicago area and has assigned two officers there since August 2023 to focus on "community engagement, relationship-building, and collaborating with local businesses and residents," according to the Star Tribune. "When you block a street, it's telling people we're closed," he continued. "It's telling our businesses that they can't come over here. And so our companies were forced to get all of our vendors, who deliver our products to keep our businesses running, they had to come down a dangerous alley where people were driving 50-60 miles an hour down an alley that you should be driving 15 down." Reed and several of his fellow business owners have since sued the city of Minneapolis, seeking $49 million in damages, the restoration of police protection, and more. The complaint describes an incident in which Reed was visiting a customer at his store when they both dove to the ground after hearing gunshots outside. When Reed called 911, the operator allegedly gave Reed a phone number to a Minneapolis gang task force officer and told Reed to call the task force officer. "Reed called the task force officer who told Reed that the Minneapolis police will not respond because the area is a 'No Go Zone,' and the officer told Reed to gather the surrounding bullet casings to bring to the officer," according to the complaint. The city filed a motion to dismiss the suit. "This is not a race or White, Black thing," Reed told Fox News Digital. "This is a principle thing here, that we are business owners, we were collateral damage, we had nothing to do with George Floyd getting killed. We were not out in the streets celebrating and protesting with everybody and all this Black Lives Matter crap. We had nothing to do with that." He said after everything he's witnessed, he's ready to leave the city behind. "My company's brand is destroyed," he maintained. "I haven't slept adequately in three-and-a-half years, because I'm waking up in the middle of the night scared because I'm thinking people are going to break into my shop. I've seen them on camera trying to burn my shop down and all kinds of things. And what I'm asking the city is, since they ruined my company, to relocate my business. I don't even want to be in this state anymore, honestly, after what we've seen here." "This whole city is in a demise right now," he said. "All the small businesses are leaving… This city is done. We'll never come back from what took place." Democratic Mayor Jacob Frey's office told Fox News Digital that it "cannot comment on pending litigation" but did acknowledge the lawsuits. When reached by Fox News Digital, a city spokesperson said they are investing in business growth, affordable housing and community development. "The intersection of 38th and Chicago – now known as George Floyd Square - is an important commercial corridor in the historically Black neighborhood of South Minneapolis," the city spokesperson said. "Since 2020, the City has been actively engaged with the community to make positive change and address both immediate and long-term needs. We honor the life and legacy of George Floyd – and what his death represents in our community and around the world. The city remains committed to addressing ongoing disparities in infrastructure, health and economic development. " "Since the summer of 2020, the City has invested more than $5 million dollars into housing, infrastructure, art preservation and social services in the area around George Floyd Square," the spokesperson continued. "These investments are designed to revitalize the neighborhood and address the community's needs. Collectively, this work aims to create a safer, more equitable and vibrant community for all residents." Additionally, the spokesperson said they've provided technical and financial assistance to local businesses, including 30 forgiven loans of $50,000, as well as made infrastructure investments such as better lighting, traffic safety improvements, and beautification efforts. The city also said there has been a noticeable improvement in safety and touted certain police reforms. "Despite staffing challenges, MPD Chief Brian O'Hara assigned two officers to a permanent beat in George Floyd Square, focused on community engagement and rebuilding trust. In fact, reports of shots fired, and auto thefts have dropped out of the top 10 calls for service in that area. The City is also changing its approach to community safety so that a police response isn't the only solution needed. Crucial to re-imagining public safety and police reform is recognizing the best response, the right response and the best use of resources." The city worked with the community around George Floyd Square and removed the barriers on June 3, 2021, 366 days after their placement on June 2, 2020, placed in such a way as to permit entry of emergency vehicles into the area, the spokesperson added. Fox News Digital also reached out to the Minneapolis Police Department for comment, but did not immediately receive a response. Other business owners named in the lawsuit, like Smoke In The Pit owner Dwight Alexander, have also said that residents are too scared to stop in for meals. "People is scared to come up here or if they do come up here, it's a different emotion, it's a different energy," he said, according to NPR. "I don't care if it's the best food, why would you go somewhere you don't feel comfortable?" Ralph Williams, owner of Ralph's VIP Barber Lounge, was shot in 2021, but police never responded when he called 911, so he had to drive himself to the hospital, according to a report from the Star Tribune. "I feel bad for the police, and let me tell you why I feel bad for them," Reed told Fox News Digital. "Those officers that are on the force, they're not Derek Chauvin. They didn't kill George Floyd, but they're getting the fingers pointed at them every time they put that blue uniform on. So I want them to understand, see how we feel. Now they know how we feel. We've lost our jobs. You guys got jobs, we lost our jobs here." "Like, I don't hate law enforcement," he added. "But, by that officer and his actions, and being on the city's watch, it made it tough for them to even get the respect from the people right now. And you've gotta blame it on the administration. You can't blame it on nobody else," he said, noting that Medaria Arodondo was police chief at the time of Floyd's death. "It's just sickening how the city treated those officers and allowed to get retirement instead of facing prosecution for their actions," Reed said. Reed wrote a book, "Hush Hush Mpls - Orders to the Spies," which, according to its description, exposes the "calculated scheme by city officials to exploit the city's grief and capitalize on the ensuing chaos." He said the proceeds from his book are going to help the small businesses who have been impacted by the violence.
New York Times
29-05-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Trump's Attacks on Black History Betray America
The Trump administration is in a hurry to bury not only America's future but also its past. Burying futures usually involves burying the truths of history. Right now the Trump administration has been systematically attacking Black history. It's set about purging Black historical content from government websites and social media accounts (only restoring a few items after being called out), removing Black history books from libraries, eliminating Black history observances, butchering the reputations of historians and starving libraries, museums, universities and historical institutions of funding. At this rate, many Americans could one day believe that George Floyd 'dies after medical incident during police interaction,' as the Minneapolis Police Department put it in its first public statement on the matter, and that the officer Derek Chauvin attempted to save his life. There is a precedent for this, of course. Consider what happened in downtown Atlanta beginning on Sept. 22, 1906. Grotesque newspaper headlines detailing alleged assaults, later referred to as a 'carnival of rapes,' mobilized white Atlantans into a mob. The violence over the next few days snatched the lives of around 40 Black Atlantans and two white Atlantans. Black Atlantans were forced to organize a self-defense, with some community members arming themselves. The carnage largely ceased with the arrival of a state militia. What became known as the Atlanta Race Massacre of 1906 had been several months in the making. It was an election year, and all year long, candidates for governor and their propagandists had enraged white Atlantans with tales of 'uppity' Black Atlantans refusing to stay 'in their place.' 'Uppity' Black Atlantans like J. Max Barber, the editor of The Voice of the Negro, perhaps the first Southern magazine to be edited by Black people. Barber had dedicated the magazine to rendering current events and 'history so accurately given and so vividly portrayed that it will become a kind of documentation for the coming generations.' Born in South Carolina, Barber had come a long way from the place of his parents, who had been enslaved. After graduating from Virginia Union University in 1903, he moved to Atlanta to edit The Voice of the Negro. He secured contributors including the renowned educator Mary Church Terrell and the Atlanta University historian W.E.B. Du Bois. In 1905, Barber joined Du Bois and 27 others in forming the Niagara Movement, a predecessor of the N.A.A.C.P. One of the Niagara Movement's main initial outlets: Barber's Voice of the Negro, which touted 15,000 subscribers. Barber refused to publish the lie about the causes of the Atlanta massacre in 1906. 'There has been no 'carnival of rapes' in and around Atlanta,' he wrote. 'There has been a frightful carnival of newspaper lies.' He figured 'this mob got its first psychological impulse from Tom Dixon's 'Clansman,'' which 'came to Atlanta last winter' as a play. Thomas Dixon Jr. had published 'The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan' in 1905, depicting Klan attacks as heroic acts of justice. D.W. Griffith adapted the novel for his 1915 film 'The Birth of a Nation.' One of the film's intertitles had been written by the president of the United States, who screened the film in the White House. 'The white men were roused by a mere instinct of self-preservation,' Woodrow Wilson had written in 1902, 'until at last there had sprung into existence a great Ku Klux Klan, a veritable empire of the South to protect the Southern country.' The Trump administration's framing of Black history as 'D.E.I.' — and 'D.E.I.' as harming white Americans — recasts its attack on Black history as protecting white Americans. As administering justice. Which is the justification of nearly every Klan and racist mob attack in history. The justification of the Atlanta attack in 1906. When Barber challenged the 'carnival of rapes' justification for the Atlanta Race Massacre in 1906, Gov. Joseph Terrell of Georgia and his Atlanta allies weaponized the criminal legal system. They threatened Barber with arrest. Police officers surveilled Barber's office. Sound familiar? Barber 'did not care to be made a slave on a Georgia chain gang.' He ran away from Georgia slavery by another name (just as there are some Americans today who are fleeing red states — and even the nation itself — out of fear). Barber fled with The Voice of the Negro on financial life support. The magazine died in Chicago in 1907. Barber's career documenting Black life and history died, too. The electrifying writer became a dentist in Philadelphia. He contributed to a few campaigns, such as erecting a statue for John Brown at the abolitionist's upstate New York gravesite in 1935 that still stands. But terror had largely silenced Barber's voice of the Negro. Life is named story. Afterlife is named history. Racist Americans have murdered Black lives and tried to murder Black afterlives, Black stories and Black history, Black storytellers and Black historians. So when Black people die, what we created, what we contributed, what we changed, what we documented dies, too. No funeral. Just gone from memory. President Trump's raid on the Black historical record is a raid on the opportunity for all Americans to know the endurance of racial inequity and injustice are consequences of the enduring history of anti-Black racist policy and violence, not what's wrong with Black people as a group. For Americans to know Black history is to know how Black ingenuity over the years has benefited them, how Black-led antiracist movements helped bring into being more equity and justice between Black people and white people, between Latino, Asian, and Native Americans and white Americans, between white men and women, between superrich white men and low- and middle-income white men. After all, the Ku Klux Klan didn't just terrorize Black Americans. Klan attacks are most remembered for whom they murdered. They are less remembered for what they murdered: all the Black towns, businesses, homes, churches, libraries, publications and careers. The very things that preserved public memory of Black history. In 1949 Barber died in Philadelphia. He was not murdered in public, like other victims of the Atlanta Race Massacre in 1906, but he was murdered from public memory. His ability to create public memory was murdered: the point of Mr. Trump's attack on Black history.
Forbes
28-05-2025
- General
- Forbes
Attitudes Toward The Police Five Years After George Floyd's Death
Lost in much of the news coverage of the 5th anniversary of George Floyd's death were reports on how Americans, especially black Americans, view their local police now. News reports focused on reforms of police practices and possible actions by the Trump administration. Yet the passage of time has affected opinions of both blacks and whites. Gallup has a large reservoir of polls that ask people about racial attitudes generally and about views of local police. In their averaging of four polls from 2024, Gallup found that blacks' confidence in their local police force now stands at 64%, nine points above the low of 55% in 2022. Black confidence was still significantly below white confidence, at 77%. In another question, slightly more than two-thirds of blacks, 67%, said local police treat people like them fairly. This response was also up nearly 10 points from 2022, when 58% gave that response. Polling organizations conducted a significant number of new polls after George Floyd's death in 2020. Americans generally saw his death at the hands of police officer Derek Chauvin as murder, and the polls showed that large numbers of whites and nonwhites said his killing was not an isolated incident. After Chauvin's trial, a CBS News/YouGov poll in 2021 found that 75% of those surveyed thought that the jury had reached the right verdict in convicting him. In polls taken at the time, blacks reported they had had more negative interactions with police than their white counterparts. But one finding in the polling was especially intriguing. More blacks than whites (41% to 33%) in a June 2020 Monmouth University poll said they or a family member had had an experience where a police officer helped keep them safe in a potentially dangerous situation. Many reforms targeting police misconduct have enjoyed widespread public support. Large majorities have endorsed body camera requirements and a ban on chokeholds, for example. But whites and blacks did not endorse defunding the police, as the results of an Ipsos/USA Today poll showed. Support for reforming the police was 51%, while 19% opposed this, and nearly three in ten, (29%), neither supported nor opposed it. But support for defunding the police was 18% (14% among whites and 28% among blacks), while 11% supported abolishing the police (9% and 22%). Low levels of support for defunding the police may explain why support for the Black Lives Matter movement and its campaign to defund the police has been consistently lower than support for the police as a whole and local police. Over the years the Harris/Harvard Center for American Political Studies has asked about police and Black Lives Matter favorability. In their new mid-May poll, 66% of registered voters had a favorable opinion of the police (22% unfavorable), with the positive response trailing only that of the top-rated institution, the military, at 77%. But in seven polls taken in 2024, support for Black Lives Matter among registered voters was around 45%. It never reached a majority. (Harvard/Harris has not asked about Black Lives Matter in 2025). What makes the new Gallup finding and that of other polls of an uptick in police favorability among blacks important is that we have seen this pattern before. Pollsters do not regularly track reactions to individuals killed by police, but occasional polls frequently show opinion of the police returning to the level of polls taken immediately after such an instance. A 1997 Public Opinion Quarterly article 'Racial Differences in Attitudes toward the Police' by Stephen A. Tuch and Ronald Weitzer showed this pattern beginning with the killing of Eulia Love, a black woman killed by Los Angeles Police Department officers in 1979 through the beating of a black man Rodney King by the LAPD in 1991. A series of polls taken by Quinnipiac University in New York City after the deaths there of Amandou Diallo by New York City police officers in 1999 and Sean Bell in 2006 shows the same pattern of a steep drop but a gradual return to more positive attitudes. Between 2016 and 2020, the Pew Research Center showed a sharp drop in views that police were doing an excellent or good job on conduct such as using the right amount of force, but then recorded an uptick in 2023. Reforms of police misconduct are necessary, but most Americans and especially most black Americans tell pollsters they need and want police in their neighborhoods and communities, and a considerable number of them say the police have helped them.
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
The Trump administration's toxic view of police reform
I was sworn in as the first-ever community safety commissioner for Minneapolis in August 2022. I began that role more than two years after Derek Chauvin, a white police officer in that city, murdered George Floyd by kneeling on his neck and back for more than nine minutes and more than a year after a jury convicted Chauvin of second- and third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. My mission was to oversee and integrate five departments: 911, the city fire department, emergency management, police, and neighborhood safety (formerly the Office of Violence Prevention). I set as my goal the development of 'a more effective, integrated approach to public safety,' to include a comprehensive 21st-century safety strategy. While I believe I laid a foundation for improvement and achieved marked crime reduction, my administration faced institutional resistance and generally inadequate resources. I retired in September 2023 not long after the Justice Department announced its findings that the Minneapolis Police Department and the city of Minneapolis had committed and were committing civil rights violations. DOJ found that the police department was using excessive force, including unjustified deadly force and unreasonable use of stun guns; unlawfully discriminating against Black people and Native American people; and violating the rights of people engaged in protected speech. The Justice Department also found that Minneapolis, when responding to calls for assistance, had discriminated against people with behavioral health disabilities. In January 2025, before President Joe Biden left office, Minneapolis and its police department cooperated with the DOJ in accepting a consent decree to guide the city's and the department's efforts toward reform and restorative justice. But last week, President Donald Trump's DOJ invalidated not only the consent decree in Minneapolis, but also one with the Louisville Metro Police Department (and Louisville/Jefferson County metro government) that was hammered out in 2024, more than four years after police there wrongly killed Breonna Taylor. The DOJ also announced that it's ending investigations into policing in Phoenix; Trenton, New Jersey; Memphis, Tennessee; Mount Vernon, New York; Oklahoma City; and the Louisiana State Police. Astoundingly, Harmeet Dhillon, Trump's assistant attorney general in charge of civil rights, didn't dispute the findings underpinning either consent decree. She simply characterized them as 'overbroad' and said such agreements 'divest local control of policing from communities where it belongs, turning that power over to unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats, often with an anti-police agenda.' Dhillon continued: 'Today, we are ending the Biden Civil Rights Division's failed experiment of handcuffing local leaders and police departments with factually unjustified consent decrees.' There's a synonym for such verbiage: garbage. To be more specific: toxic garbage. I have devoted the better part of my life to police work and public safety. I am a firm believer in community policing, the cooperation between local law enforcement and the people of the local community it serves. The argument that dismissing the consent decrees will improve law enforcement by 'returning' it to local control is mistaken. In fact, this action will reduce the effectiveness of local policing, which has enjoyed a fruitful partnership with federal law enforcement. Even worse, it will weaken the bonds between local police agencies and the communities because members of those communities will feel they have no place to seek justice when their local force violates their civil rights. Without mutual trust and respect, local police agencies are bound to fail. We can presume that Dhillon is articulating the Trump administration's view of justice. Such a view, however, is either the product of ignorance of the constitutional foundation of American law, or it is a willful denial of that foundation. Whatever the cause, the decision to invalidate the consent decrees is outrageous and terrifying. Pushing back on Dhillon's assertion that the consent decrees were unwarranted and a reflection of anti-police bias, Kristen Clarke, who led the Civil Rights Division before Dhillon did, said: 'To be clear, [the] investigations [on which the consent decrees were founded] were led by career attorneys, based on data, body camera footage and information provided by officers themselves, and the reforms set forth in consent decrees were carefully negotiated with the full support of law enforcement leaders and local officials.' Every community in the United States is subject to the rights and responsibilities set forth in the Constitution and in the laws that flow from the Constitution. A violation of civil rights is a crime whether it is committed in a blue, red or purple state, in Minneapolis or Louisville. It is a self-evident truth and the entire sum and substance of democracy. It cannot be twisted with fatuous words into something else. As an American and as a longtime American peace officer, I feel a combination of shame, disgust and disbelief that the Justice Department would abdicate its role in making law enforcement agencies follow the Constitution. We, as Americans, simply cannot consent to this. This article was originally published on
