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April 8, 2021 - The Ben Shapiro Show

47:53

The Prosecution Against Derek Chauvin Is Collapsing | Ep. 1231

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	The state's case against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd is falling apart, but the media continue to promote the lie that it's a slam dunk and riots may follow.
	I'm Ben Shapiro.
	This is the Ben Shapiro Show.
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	Slash Ben will get to all the details of the news in just one moment.
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	Alrighty, so.
	The Derek Chauvin trial continues in Minneapolis.
	And if you watch the media, the takeaway that you're going to get from the media is that this trial is over, that the trial shouldn't even be taking place.
	And in fact, if you watch members of sort of the Glitterati talk about the Chauvin trial, they're saying things like, why is there even a trial?
	There's a tape.
	We've all seen the tape.
	And if you look at the headlines from the media, the headlines from the media only feature the stuff the prosecution is saying.
	It's kind of amazing, actually.
	The media are not featuring any of the headlines that are being made on Cross.
	Which is the stuff that's actually in the news.
	Instead, they're only focusing in on what the prosecution is claiming so that you would think that the outcome in this case is a foregone conclusion.
	And the reason they are doing that is because if you think that this case is a foregone conclusion, that means there's only one reason and one reason alone that Derek Chauvin might be acquitted in this particular case.
	And that, of course, is the media's favorite narrative.
	Systemic American racism.
	If Chauvin is acquitted, say the media, the only reason that could happen is systemic American racism because this case is absolutely clear-cut.
	There are no questions to be asked about it.
	There is no reason that you would be worried about it.
	For example, here's a Washington Post headline from yesterday, quote, trial to resume after training officer says an unauthorized neck restraint was used on George Floyd. So sounds like an unauthorized neck restraint was used on George Floyd.
	According to uncontroverted testimony from the prosecution witness, this means it was an unauthorized neck restraint, which means that this looks a lot like felony assault.
	Except, what we will explore in just a second, is that on cross, most of the main witnesses for the state have been falling apart.
	Remember, the standard here is reasonable doubt.
	Now, I'm not making the case that Chauvin is innocent.
	I don't know.
	Neither do you.
	And this is the point.
	The standard in American criminal law is reasonable doubt.
	And let's just put it out there right now.
	If you look at this case and you don't see reasonable doubt, I'm not sure what case you are watching.
	It seems to me that you want to come to a conclusion That was already preset in your mind.
	If you're watching how this case is going for the prosecution and your immediate takeaway is it's still as clear-cut as I thought it was before the trial.
	If anything, this case has made the case for Chauvin significantly stronger and the defense hasn't even begun its own formal defense as of yet.
	How bad is this case going for the prosecution?
	The prosecution called a witness the other day.
	They called a witness who is a use-of-force expert.
	And the use of force expert was so bad that the prosecutors were getting visibly angry at their own witness.
	A medical support expert for the Minneapolis Police Department was called by the prosecution.
	She was so bad that the defense is going to call her, the prosecution witness.
	The defense is going to turn around and call the prosecution witness because the prosecution witness was so bad for the prosecution in this case.
	Does this mean prosecutors are incompetent?
	No, it means this case is actually extremely difficult.
	On the fact pattern, because there are several things that were never proved by the media before we had 20 million people out in the streets suggesting, number one, that this was a case of uncontroverted police evil and brutality, and two, that it was a case of police racism.
	The second claim, nobody ever bothered to substantiate at all.
	That's truly an amazing thing.
	The entire BLM movement was rooted in the lie that America's police officers are systemically racist, that they are out to get black people, and George Floyd was used as exhibit A. They have still yet to demonstrate an iota of evidence that Derek Chauvin's behavior was driven by animus for black people, like they've not demonstrated any of it.
	Now, what's amazing about that is that you can absolutely find cases in America in which there's an uncontroverted fact pattern of racism.
	So for example, if you look at the Ahmaud Arbery case down in Georgia, this is the case where there's a black guy and he was trespassing in a house, and then somebody saw him trespassing in the house, it was an empty house, so he was trespassing in like an empty construction site, and then he started running away.
	The original story, he was just jogging through the neighborhood, that wasn't true, but what happened is some people started chasing him in their trucks, they stopped the trucks, and according to some of the witness testimony, After he confronted them and they were holding guns trying to stop him and hold him for the cops, which they weren't supposed to be doing.
	After he did that, they shot him, okay?
	And apparently the N-word was used.
	That seems like at least an allegation of racism that could hold up in court.
	You know what has never been alleged about the Chauvin case?
	Any element of racism.
	They've never found it.
	You think they wouldn't have dug?
	You think they wouldn't have gone into Derek Chauvin's social media posts and tried to find something?
	Okay, so that claim was never substantiated in any way.
	But here's the thing.
	Even if that claim had been substantiated in some way, it would not answer the question as to whether Chauvin actually murdered George Floyd.
	So to reset here, here is what George Floyd has been charged with.
	He has been charged with second-degree murder, or Derek Chauvin has been charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder, third-degree manslaughter.
	Those are the three crimes with which Chauvin has been charged.
	In order for the prosecution in this particular case to elicit a guilty verdict, they first have to show causation.
	That it was Chauvin's actions that led to the death of George Floyd.
	And that's actually a pretty high bar as we're going to explore in just one moment.
	The autopsy report, for example, showed that Floyd had fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system.
	In fact, he had three times what is normally considered the fatal dose of fentanyl in his system.
	Now some people are arguing that he'd built up a resistance to fentanyl over the years.
	Three times the amount that normally kills somebody is still a lot of fentanyl.
	It's enough fentanyl to kill a horse.
	That was in his system.
	The original medical autopsy, the only actual medical autopsy done of Floyd's body, found that Chauvin's neck hold did not, in fact, cause any damage to Floyd's trachea.
	So the notion that he choked him to death, that he couldn't breathe because his airway was being compressed, that was not true.
	So maybe Chauvin's neck restraint contributed to Floyd's death by ratcheting up his blood pressure, but here's the thing.
	Would that have happened if Floyd did not already have a 75% arterial blockage?
	Very doubtful.
	Did drug use have something to do with Floyd's death?
	Seems like that is, as we will see, a fairly well-evidenced case, is that his drug use had something to do with his death.
	Okay, then you get to the actual charges and the elements of the actual charges in the George Floyd-Derek Chauvin case.
	are very difficult to prove.
	First of all, they're second-degree murder.
	Okay, second-degree murder requires that the prosecution has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Chauvin unintentionally killed Floyd while committing a felony, in this case, felony assault.
	In other words, he was committing a felony on Floyd simply, like, if nothing else had happened in this case, if Floyd didn't die, that would have been felony assault, what Chauvin was doing to Floyd.
	That's gonna be very, very difficult to prove because that requires intentional infliction of bodily harm.
	And as the defense has been suggesting throughout, the kind of use of force that Chauvin was using was actually a lesser use of force than the Minneapolis Police Department allows.
	They would have to show that Chauvin wanted to hurt Floyd, not just use a suppression tactic that had been greenlit by the Minneapolis Police Department.
	Third-degree murder doesn't even apply.
	Third-degree murder is what's called depraved heart murder.
	As I've suggested many times, depraved heart murder is a crime where you shoot a gun into a crowd.
	And we can't convict you of specific intent to kill Bob, but Bob was one of the members of the crowd, so we convict you instead of depraved heart murder because you didn't care who died, you just knew somebody was likely to die when you shot a gun into the crowd.
	That doesn't apply here.
	Because Chauvin didn't neck suppress a hundred people and one of them died.
	That's not the way this worked.
	Okay, then there's second-degree manslaughter.
	Not third-degree, second-degree manslaughter.
	That requires the prosecution prove that Chauvin acted with gross negligence.
	But gross negligence would have to show that Chauvin should have known his behavior might actually cause Floyd's death.
	Okay, but how many times has this suppression tactic been used on various suspects?
	How many of them actually die?
	In the absence of excited delirium?
	Or in the absence of serious drug use?
	Or serious heart problem?
	So in any case, this is not an easy case and we're going to get into all of the testimony that's been had over the past couple of days because it's horrible for the prosecution case.
	But the broader point here is that the media are ignoring so much of this.
	The media do not want to report any of this stuff.
	What the media would like to report, you'll see some of it covered on Headline News to be fair, what the mainstream media are reporting, the establishment media, the Washington Post, what they are reporting is that not only is Chauvin guilty, no question he's guilty, police departments all over America are guilty.
	We'll get to that lie in just one second.
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	OK, so as I say, the media agenda here is to suggest that this case is a foregone conclusion, that there are no serious doubts that any rational jury could have.
	The Washington Post is pushing this idea.
	Their editorial board today.
	They say.
	One of the things that this case is not about is all policing or all policing.
	This is what the prosecution told the jury in opening arguments in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer charged with the murder of George Floyd.
	Driving home that point, prosecutors have called to the witness stand a number of police officers to testify against Derek Chauvin, all of whom condemned how he knelt on Floyd's neck for more than nine minutes.
	The spectacle of so many officers testifying against one of their own was unusual, and a welcome break from the so-called blue wall of silence that has long enabled police misconduct.
	However, the singling out of Mr. Chauvin doesn't give a pass to Minneapolis or other cities for the systemic issues that have fueled brutality against people of color.
	Most police officers serve bravely and with integrity, says the Washington Post.
	If Mr. Chauvin, as the prosecution has essentially argued, is that rare bad apple, Who violated his badge, why wasn't something done sooner?
	During his nearly two decades with the department, Mr. Chauvin shot one suspect, was involved in the fatal shooting of another, and received at least 17 complaints.
	Okay, number one.
	Is the Washington Post making an allegation it was a wrongful shooting?
	Either of those?
	Really, where's the allega- Do we have any details on the allegations?
	As far as being the subject of complaints, police officers are routinely subjected to complaints, the vast majority of which are completely specious.
	The vast majority of complaints against police officers generally involve suspects involved in bad behavior who don't like the fact that they are being arrested.
	But says the Washington Post, if police training is state-of-the-art, how to account for the failure of other police to act, including three officers who are set to go to trial in August for aiding and abetting Floyd's murder.
	By the way, no way those guys get convicted.
	That's going to be so hard to try and convict those guys.
	One has to wonder what would have happened if a young bystander to Floyd's arrest hadn't had the presence of mind and bravery to film the events and show the world the damning evidence.
	Would George Floyd have become just another incidence of force used disproportionately against black people?
	Prosecutors are right that the jury will decide the guilt or innocence of Mr. Chauvin, but make no mistake, policing is also on trial.
	Okay, the predicate to that piece is that there is no doubt whatsoever that not only did Chauvin act wrongly, not only did he misjudge the situation, he purposefully killed George Floyd, and police all over the country are doing the same.
	There's only one problem with this narrative.
	The evidence is not backing it up thus far in this case.
	It just is not.
	Okay, so let's begin with the chief question here.
	What was the cause of death?
	So in order to convict Chauvin of murder, you first have to show causation.
	That it was his actions that led to Floyd's death.
	And it can't just be but-for causation.
	There's two types of causation.
	There's causation in fact, and there's but-for causation.
	But-for causation means there's a chain of events leading to an outcome.
	But-for, any link in that chain, the outcome would not happen.
	So for example, if George Floyd doesn't get out of bed in the morning, He doesn't die.
	That day.
	Maybe.
	Right?
	So that is a but-for causation fact.
	If the person in front of him at the stoplight had sped through a yellow, maybe he's not there at that particular time and place.
	Is that person responsible for his death?
	No, because there's a difference between but-for causation and then causation in fact.
	If there are many intervening factors in a particular case, that goes to the question of causation in fact.
	So, the defense is arguing, I think on fairly strong terms here, that George Floyd's massive drug use contributed to his death.
	And that if you have to allocate where the causation lies, it lies much more with Floyd's drug use than it lies with Chauvin using this suppression hold.
	Hey, this is the subject of controversy, but that's the entire point.
	You don't have to believe that the defense is 100% correct to acknowledge that reasonable doubt exists.
	Because again, the standard in criminal law is not, who do I think is right?
	But can you prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that's a very high standard in criminal law, beyond a reasonable doubt that Chauvin killed Floyd?
	Not Floyd's pre-existing heart condition and massive drug use.
	OK, so how extensive was Floyd's drug use?
	And people are saying this is slandering Floyd.
	It's not slandering Floyd.
	It goes to the heart of the case.
	This is one of the ways that the media bias the case.
	They say you're not even allowed to talk about Floyd's behavior in the lead up to the actual tape.
	You're not allowed to talk about Floyd's medical status.
	Well, if you're not allowed to talk about that stuff, then we should be honest to God should not have defense in this country.
	We should not have legal defenses in this country if you can't talk about the factors leading to the guy's death.
	So this is not an argument about Floyd's character because, frankly, his character doesn't matter here.
	The only thing that matters here is the causation.
	That's the only thing that matters.
	That's why I don't find it particularly relevant what his criminal history was.
	He had a bad criminal history.
	I don't think it's very relevant to this case, what his criminal history was, other than police running his name, for example, or his ID, and recognizing that maybe in the past he'd had run-ins with cops, and so you have to be extremely careful with him, right?
	The question is always, what is the relevance of the evidence to this particular case?
	So, the relevance here is that George Floyd was a serious drug addict.
	Not only was he a serious drug addict, he's a serious drug addict who had overdosed in the recent past.
	Courtney Ross is Floyd's girlfriend, and she testified on the stand that just a few months ago, he actually overdosed, and then she had to bring him to the ER.
	He wasn't feeling good.
	His stomach really hurt.
	He was doubled over in pain.
	Just wasn't feeling well, and he said he had to go to the hospital, so I took him straight to the hospital.
	You later learned that that was due to an overdose?
	Yes.
	Okay, well, he'd already overdosed in the past few months.
	Not only did he already overdose in the past few months, as we will see, he was high at the time that he was arrested.
	Quite high, right?
	By the toxicology report, very, very high.
	And not only that, his drug dealer was in the car with him.
	In all likelihood.
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	Alrighty, so.
	It turns out that the man in the car with George Floyd, the day he died, refuses to testify.
	Now, his testimony might be relevant, you think?
	The reason that he's refusing to testify is because he was his drug dealer.
	The man's name is Maurice Hall.
	He's currently in jail.
	He appeared via Zoom at a court hearing on Tuesday morning, in which his attorney argued he has no immunity from prosecution that stems from testimony about his and Floyd's behavior while seated in a Mercedes-Benz SUV shortly before the police arrived on May 25th and arrested Floyd.
	Hey, now, here's the weird part.
	Here's the weird part.
	Normally, it is the prosecution that can offer immunity.
	Not normally, it's the only way this works.
	The prosecution goes to somebody whose testimony they want, and they offer him immunity in exchange for his testimony.
	The prosecution doesn't want Maurice Haltz to testify.
	Isn't that somewhat suspicious?
	The man sitting next to George Floyd, in the car, his drug dealer, they don't want him to testify.
	And the defense can't compel his testimony because he can use the fifth.
	Why is he claiming the fifth?
	Why is he saying that he might incriminate himself?
	Because he is afraid that he's going to be forced to testify that he gave George Floyd the drugs that killed him and then he will be charged with third-degree manslaughter.
	That is what he is afraid of.
	Or third-degree homicide.
	Because he's committing a felony.
	So that means it's felony murder.
	Right?
	So this is...
	A serious problem, okay?
	If you're the prosecution, normally, it would seem kind of relevant to, you know, question the guy in the car with Floyd.
	Maybe that guy says that Floyd wasn't high.
	Maybe that guy says that Floyd was exhibiting no symptoms of having any sort of medical trouble, right?
	All that testimony would be relevant.
	The prosecution is not offering him immunity because they don't want him to testify.
	And the reason they don't want him to testify is because they are afraid that then the defense will question the guy and the defense will say, by the way, didn't you give this guy enough drugs to kill him?
	And then the cases exploded.
	So it's kind of a big deal that Maurice Hall does not want to testify.
	According to Nelson, Eric Nelson is the lawyer for Chauvin, he says that the jury would hear from Hall.
	He said this will include evidence that while they were in the car, Floyd consumed what he thought were two Percocet painkiller pills.
	But they were not Percocet.
	Nelson said Mr. Floyd's friends will explain that Floyd fell asleep in the car and that they couldn't wake him to get him going, and they thought the police might be coming because the store employees were coming out.
	But now, Hall's lawyer says he won't take the witness stand.
	The lawyer says, Your Honor, I can't envision any topic that Mr. Hall would be called to testify on that would be both relevant to the case that would not incriminate him.
	Mr. Hall's testimony in these matters would specifically put him in the position of being in very close proximity to Mr. Floyd in a vehicle where drugs were found during a search by police following Floyd's death.
	Courtney Ross actually testified that Maurice Hall was the person selling pills to Floyd.
	Here is Courtney Ross, Floyd's girlfriend, talking about this, saying that Floyd purchased drugs from Hall in the past, that these drugs had not been good for George Floyd, that they had exacerbated him, made him really agitated, and that they continued to have those pills around from March through May.
	Would you agree with me that the FBI agents asked you, from March to May, if you continued to purchase those pills from the same source. Did they ask you that question? They did. And you responded once in a while when we were desperate, agreed? That's what it says, yes.
	Okay, not only that, they found, this is an incredible thing.
	Okay, the investigators on the scene, they went to look at the police squad car.
	Okay, Chauvin's lawyers went to look at the police squad car.
	This is six months after the incident.
	Okay, and what they turned out to find were half-chewed pills on the floor of the squad car that had Floyd's DNA on them.
	Somehow, the police investigators missed all of that.
	How is that even possible?
	This is the highest profile criminal case that we've had in this country, probably since O.J.
	Simpson.
	And the notion that they missed key evidence, like, you know, the half-chewed pills that had meth and also had fentanyl in them, they had traces both in the pills, that those had George Floyd's DNA on them, in the back of the squad car, and they somehow missed that?
	Normally, that would be enough right there to provide reasonable doubt.
	They somehow missed that.
	Okay, so if that's not enough for you, the evidence here in terms of reasonable doubt is very solid.
	The reason I'm bringing this up is not to say that you have to think that Derek Chauvin is a wonderful person or God forbid George Floyd deserved to die or anything like that.
	Nothing like that.
	The point I'm making here is that the media are lying to you when they say there's no case for reasonable doubt.
	There's an extremely strong case for reasonable doubt.
	Hey, here's another piece of evidence.
	You've only been told by the prosecution and by the media that you should watch the 8 minutes and 46 seconds.
	That is the only part of the tape that matters.
	Here's a section of the tape from approximately 2 minutes before.
	That is from body cam footage.
	In which George Floyd is screaming that he cannot breathe before he is out of the car.
	If he cannot breathe before he is out of the car, then whatever suffering he was having with regard to his breathing was not initiated by Derek Chauvin's knee.
	It was initiated by some exterior circumstance.
	At this point, nothing had happened that could even remotely be considered felony assault by the police officers.
	They'd really gently attempted to put him in the car.
	He was resisting arrest.
	He was shouting.
	He asked them to crack a window.
	They said, we will absolutely do that.
	He said, I'm claustrophobic.
	He forced his way out of the car.
	He said he would prefer to be on the ground rather than in the car.
	He's already before Chauvin even approaches him.
	Before Chauvin approaches him, George Floyd is saying he can't breathe.
	Which means that if you take him seriously, Which, given the fact that apparently he died of some form of asphyxia, whether it is drug-induced asphyxia or physically-induced asphyxia, it's more likely to be drug-induced asphyxia if you're complaining that you can't breathe before there's any possibility of positional or physically-induced asphyxia.
	And here is the tape of George Floyd saying he can't breathe before he's even out of the car.
	Please, please, please, please, please.
	I can't joke. I can't breathe. Please.
	For those who can't see, he's still in the squad car at this point.
	This is not when Chauvin is on him.
	He's in the squad car.
	He's resisting arrest and he's shouting, I can't choke.
	He's shouting, I'm choking.
	I can't breathe.
	That seems like a fairly solid case for reasonable doubt when it comes to causation, does it not?
	But it doesn't stop there.
	So meanwhile, the defense is making yet another case.
	Okay, and that case is that you've seen all of this tape of Chauvin on the back of Floyd's neck.
	Except that there is a camera differential here.
	It depends on the camera angle.
	So, you've all seen the tape that was taken by the bystander of the George Floyd incident.
	There's body cam footage as well.
	The defense lawyers brought out that footage.
	And what that footage appears to show is that there's an angle where it looks like Chauvin is on Floyd's neck.
	Okay?
	This is the angle that's very famous.
	And then there's the angle where you can actually see his knee.
	His knee from this angle is not, in fact, on George Floyd's neck.
	At least not for the bulk of the time.
	His knee is on George Floyd's shoulder and his back.
	You know who testified to this?
	The police chief, Midaria Arandondo.
	Okay, this is the guy who was saying that Chauvin was using unapproved use of force that led to the death.
	So this goes to causation.
	It also goes to whether it's an approved use of force.
	Okay, if you've got a knee on somebody's shoulder blade, that is a very different thing from if you have a knee on somebody's carotid artery or something.
	Here is the defense lawyer getting the police chief in Minneapolis who is testifying against Chauvin to acknowledge that his knee appears to be on his shoulder, not on his neck.
	You can see clearly from the body footage right here that his knee is actually on the back of his of his back.
	Would you agree that from the perspective of Officer King's body camera, it appears that Officer Chauvin's knee was more on Mr. Floyd's shoulder blade?
	Yes.
	Okay, and you can see the hesitancy there from the Minneapolis police chief because he really doesn't want to answer that particular question because it really makes it difficult to convict somebody for putting a knee on somebody's shoulder blade if they then die of some sort of asphyxia.
	Okay, then the lawyer also elicited the same exact testimony from the prosecution's use of force expert.
	Again, this is all the stuff that they're not going to show you on CNN.
	They'll show it maybe on CNN Headline News and discuss it, but nobody watches that.
	So the mainstream, most watched, Establishment media will not focus on these particular stories because they really, really undercut the prosecution's case.
	It's important, once again, because it completely undercuts the media narrative that this case is a foregone conclusion and any acquittal is just evidence of evil American racism.
	Here is the defense lawyer eliciting the exact same testimony from the prosecution's use of force expert.
	Based on your observation of this photograph, it appears that the shin is coming from the top of the shoulder.
	Across the shoulder blade, correct?
	Yes, sir.
	Again, can you see what appears to be the placement of the leg of one of the officers at the shoulder blade of Mr. Floyd?
	It appears so.
	And again, here we have what appears to be the shin coming over the top of Mr. Floyd's shoulder blade?
	That's what it appears.
	Okay.
	Well, I mean, again, if you're building a case for reasonable doubt, Looks a lot like a reasonable doubt.
	And meanwhile, they also elicited testimony.
	All of this is about causation.
	They did Sheldon's knee cause George Floyd's death.
	Or was it the massive amounts of drugs in George Floyd's system, the 75% arterial blockage, and the fact that George Floyd was quite high before any of this occurred?
	The ER physician called, again, these are all prosecution witnesses who are being kind of taken apart by the defense here.
	This is a prosecution witness.
	This is the ER physician, Dr. Bradford Wankhede Langenfeld.
	Now, important to note that Dr. Langenfeld here never actually met George Floyd while he was alive.
	He didn't care for George Floyd while he was alive.
	By the time that he got to the hospital, George Floyd had essentially expired.
	He'd basically flatlined while he was in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.
	If he did see him, it was like the very end and he had no information as to drug use at that point because all he saw in front of him is a body.
	And so he had testified that this was the leading cause of death here, the most likely cause of death was asphyxia.
	And so the media ran, this is the one where the media run with the headline, it was asphyxia that caused this, right?
	Which makes it sound as though Chauvin chokeholded him to death.
	There's only one problem.
	As the defense points out, asphyxia does not necessarily mean that you died of air being lost because somebody is physically manipulating your body.
	Asphyxia is a quite predictable result of drug overdose.
	Hey, so here is the ER physician admitting this on the stand.
	Was your leading theory then for the cause of Mr. Floyd's cardiac arrest oxygen deficiency?
	That was one of the more likely possibilities.
	There are many things that cause hypoxia that would still be considered asphyxiation.
	Agreed?
	Agreed.
	Drug use.
	Certain drugs can cause hypoxia.
	Agreed?
	Specifically fentanyl.
	That's correct.
	How about methamphetamine?
	It can.
	Combination of the two?
	Yes.
	I'm sorry, that's devastating stuff.
	So their expert, the prosecution expert is like, yeah, it was hypoxia and asphyxia.
	And the defense is like, OK, you know what could also cause that is drug use like fentanyl and meth.
	And the expert's like, yep.
	Reasonable doubt, guys, that's the standard reasonable doubt.
	OK, and if that weren't enough for you on the causation issue, tape emerged yesterday, brought out by the defense of George Floyd yelling.
	And this is now in dispute.
	Okay, this is kind of amazing.
	The witness that was brought forth by the prosecution was asked about this.
	Remember, this is all being done on cross-examination by the defense counsel.
	This is doing a pretty good job here.
	The tape was brought forth by the defense counsel of George Floyd appearing to say something.
	What he's saying is in dispute here.
	You have to make up your mind for yourself.
	Originally, the prosecution witness agreed with Nelson, the defense attorney, that what Floyd is saying here is, I ate too many drugs.
	Which... I mean, if you're talking causation and what causes the death, if the person who died is shouting at the police officers, he ate too many drugs, and then he dies of what could be a drug overdose, that's not just reasonable doubt.
	That is like super reasonable doubt.
	Hey, here's the tape, and here's Nelson asking about it.
	I'd like you to see if you can tell me what Mr. Floyd says in this instance.
	You hear what he said?
	No, I couldn't make it out.
	Does it sound like he says, I ate too many drugs?
	You hear what he said?
	No, I couldn't make it out.
	Does it sound like he says I ate too many drugs?
	Listen again.
	Oh, OK, so the original testimony there was, yes, it sounds like I ate too many drugs.
	Then, they went to recess.
	When they came back, the prosecution on recross, on redirect, asked, does it sound like I ain't doing no drugs?
	And here's the thing about vague audio.
	Once you hear it in your brain, it kind of switches a switch, right?
	So you can't actually tell what's being said.
	So it could be either one.
	But again, the physical evidence here is pretty damning with regard to Floyd's drug use.
	His drug dealer won't testify for fear of being self-incriminating.
	The leading ER doctor there is testifying that hypoxia can be caused by drug use.
	What is a more likely scenario?
	Seriously, what is a more likely scenario here?
	That George Floyd died because there was an officer who's 140 pounds, putting his knee on the back of his neck, even though that's not been shown, right?
	For a lot of this, you have the witnesses testifying it's on a shoulder blade.
	It's up here, right?
	Like on the very top of his back.
	But what is a more likely scenario?
	I mean, the original medical examiner, the medical autopsy, originally suggested that if Floyd had been found dead in his house, they immediately would have declared it a drug overdose.
	And so all of that goes to causation.
	We haven't even gotten to the use of force yet.
	That's how scanty the prosecution case here is.
	This is a very difficult case for the prosecution.
	And we're gonna get to more of this in just one second.
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	Alright, we'll get to more of the collapsing prosecution here, because we haven't even gotten started yet.
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	Okay, the other part of the prosecution case is the felony assault case, right?
	This is the second-degree murder charge.
	So the idea here is not that Chauvin intended to kill Floyd.
	The idea here is that he intended to commit a felony assault against Floyd, and then Floyd died in the process.
	In order to say that, You have to say that it was not only unreasonable, it was insanely unreasonable for Derek Chauvin to apply the kind of force he was applying, because the Minneapolis Police Department explicitly allows the kinds of hold that Chauvin was using here.
	So you would have to say that Chauvin ignored all of the evidence of what was going on that was in front of him, that Chauvin deliberately wanted to inflict pain on George Floyd, that he was ignoring all of the George Floyd's pleas for help, despite the fact that he should have believed George Floyd and that the crowd posed no threat.
	Okay, so, the prosecution, to back that idea, called the Minneapolis Police Department Use of Force trainer, a guy named Johnny Mersel.
	And in his testimony, he said, yes, this is unapproved use of force.
	He talked about the continuum of the use of force.
	He basically said that when the suspect is non-actively resisting, that you're not supposed to use this procedure.
	He didn't really get into the details of how you decide whether somebody is actively resisting or passively resisting, because at one point Floyd kicked and some of the cops were saying that he seems like he's resisting again.
	In any case, it was on cross that this particular witness for the state completely fell apart.
	Okay, so the MPD use of force trainer, remember there's a prosecution witness, Johnny Mercil, he specifically asked, okay, so, you know, have you ever been in a situation where a suspect claims a medical emergency and you ignore the medical emergency because the suspect is just lying?
	Have you ever talked to cops?
	By the way, this happens a lot.
	The people who are arrested, turns out they don't like being arrested.
	Many times they will claim that brutality is taking place or that they are experiencing some sort of medical emergency in order to Have you had people say they were having a medical emergency?
	Yes, sir.
	Have you had people say, I can't breathe?
	brought by the prosecution to testify.
	Asks, have you ever personally disbelieved a suspect's claim of medical emergency?
	Have you had people say they were having a medical emergency?
	Yes, sir.
	Would you, have you had people say, I can't breathe?
	Yes, sir.
	And do you, were there circumstances during the course of your career as a patrol officer where you didn't believe that that person was having a medical emergency?
	Yes, sir.
	Okay, so their own use of force specialist is saying it's certainly plausible that if somebody's claiming a medical emergency, you don't necessarily take them at their word because a lot of people are just not telling the truth in these particular circumstances.
	In this case, Floyd was telling the truth, but that doesn't change.
	In order, again, intent is an element of the crime.
	You have to prove intent to say that it was felony assault.
	It can't just be an accident.
	It has to be intent to be felony assault.
	It also turns out that the suppression tactic that was being used here by Chauvin is a lesser use of force than some of the other use of forces that were available.
	For example, there's something called a hobble.
	A hobble is basically you chain somebody's legs together in the back, you chain their hands together in the back, and then you chain them together so they really can't move.
	I kind of trust up.
	That sounds pretty horrible.
	That is a greater use of force.
	That was not used here.
	So it turns out that the hold that Chauvin was using was actually not at the end of the continuum of use of force, right?
	There are other ones beyond that.
	Mercel did testify to that.
	Mercel also testified that you can have situations where somebody who is high on drugs seems to be stronger than normal, which means that you're afraid that they might buck you off.
	That's particularly true in a case where there's a significant physical imbalance.
	In this particular case, George Floyd is a very large man, very muscular man.
	He's 6'5 and 240, or 6'5 and 230.
	Chauvin is like 5'9 and 140.
	In any case, here was the, again, police use of force trainer who was called by the prosecution, acknowledging that drugs can make suspects stronger.
	In your experience, have you ever had to use force against somebody who's under the influence of a controlled substance?
	Yes, sir.
	Do you train officers that certain controlled substances can cause a person to exhibit more strength than they would have otherwise?
	Yes, sir.
	Okay, and not just that.
	Mercel also testified, this lieutenant, Minneapolis Police Department, he also testified, you can have suspects go unconscious and then resuscitate and be more aggressive than they were before they were unconscious.
	All of this goes to Chauvin's mindset.
	You have to prove intent beyond a reasonable doubt.
	Here is Mercel again.
	In your experience after a person has been rendered unconscious using a neck restraint, is it possible for them to continue to fight after they come back to consciousness?
	It is possible, yes.
	Have you experienced that personally?
	I have not experienced somebody fighting after neck restraint.
	But you're aware the Minneapolis Police Department trains people that that is a possibility?
	Yes, sir.
	And in fact, sometimes they can be just as aggressive or even more aggressive after coming to consciousness?
	That is possible, yes.
	Okay, so the Minneapolis Police Force trains for that.
	So when people resist arrest, they're typically going to use suppression holds in this way.
	Okay, or at least they have.
	How do we know that?
	Because Mersel then testified that he had personally used neck restraints until EMS arrived.
	Okay, that he called emergency medical services and that he was still afraid that the person was resisting arrest and so he continued to use neck restraints.
	This is the use of force specialist for MPD.
	They have to show that Chauvin completely ignored the MPD use of force standards because he wanted to commit a felony assault beyond a reasonable doubt.
	I don't know how you get beyond a reasonable doubt with testimony like this from the prosecution witness.
	Sometimes an officer has called for EMS, correct?
	That's correct.
	And sometimes an officer may hold a person, using their body weight to restrain them, awaiting the arrival of EMS, correct?
	Yes, sir.
	You've done that yourself?
	I have.
	And sometimes you've had to, or was it fair to say that you've had to train officers to use their body weight to continue holding them until EMS arrives?
	As long as needed to control them, yes.
	Okay, so this brings up the question, as long as you need to control.
	So what happened in those final three minutes, right?
	So the prosecution's case now turns to, okay, well, fine.
	Let's say all that's true.
	In the last three minutes, it's pretty clear that at that point, even if you're worried that Floyd is gonna wake up and that Floyd is gonna be more aggressive, why didn't you start CPR chest compressions?
	Why didn't you start resuscitating him?
	Because there's a sort of three minute gap near the end of the tape before EMS arrives.
	Why weren't you performing chest compressions?
	Why weren't you doing anything?
	Because you have a duty of care to people who are in your custody.
	The defense is making the case that the officers were distracted by the crowd, that the officers were having a difficult time performing any sort of medical care on Floyd because the crowd was getting aggressive.
	This is the case that Nelson was making very early on in the case.
	This is the defense attorney.
	There are people across the street.
	There are cars stopping, people yelling.
	There is a growing crowd and what officers perceive to be a threat.
	They're called names.
	I heard them this morning.
	A f***ing bomb.
	They're screaming at them.
	Causing the officers to divert their attention from the care of Mr. Floyd to the threat that was growing in front of them.
	Okay, so the case that the defense is making is that when you have an unruly crowd that is getting aggressive with the cops, this means that it's very difficult for them to just go into full-scale, we gotta do medical rescue mode because they are too busy worried about the fact that they might get charged by the people in the crowd.
	And there's some footage from the crowd that day.
	People are screaming, people are yelling.
	And one of the people I believe, one of the people who I think testified last week actually, has to be physically held back by somebody else in the crowd.
	And in fact, again, the prosecution witness, the use of force expert, the prosecution witness, he said, yeah, you know, unruly crowds are a factor in whether or not you have to restrain a suspect.
	In terms of the continuation of use of force, and we're talking about involvement of onlookers, right?
	The words they use matter, correct?
	Yes, they do.
	If they're cheering on and saying, good job, officer, that's one consideration, right?
	Correct.
	But if they're saying, I'd slap the f* out of you, or you're a p*y, or you're a chump, Would that reasonably tend to rise alarm in a police officer?
	Yes, sir.
	Hey, those are the exact quotes from the people in the crowd.
	He just read the police use of force expert called by the prosecution, the exact quotes from the crowd.
	And the police use of force expert overtly testified that that is a factor in whether you restrain the suspect or not, or whether you can give medical care.
	Then you had Officer Nicole McKenzie.
	She was the medical support specialist for the MPD.
	And she also testified, same thing.
	She said unsafe crowd circumstances can prevent CPR, for example.
	One of the reasons you stop performing CPR is because it's not safe, right?
	Correct.
	And by it being not safe, are you referring to the process of actually getting CPR or the environment that you would be doing it in?
	It would be the environment around you.
	Okay.
	And so it stands to reason that if the environment around you you would determine to be not safe, you may not start it right away.
	That would be a better, reasonable, yes.
	Okay, so one of the things that happened here is that when the EMS arrived on scene, the first thing that they did was they apparently did not perform CPR on Floyd at the scene.
	They did what they call a load and scoot, right? They got him on the gurney, they put him in the ambulance, and then they started to treat him. So Nelson asked why, right? Why did they do a load and scoot? And McKenzie said, well, one reason that the, was that the patient might need immediate care that could only be provided at a hospital, like an emergency surgery.
	But is there another reason?
	And McKenzie said, there are some times when the crowd is so aggressive that we, the EMS, not even the cops, the EMS cannot provide normal medical care.
	And so if they did a load and scoot in this particular case, Then why would they do that?
	Were the EMS also participating in the murder of George Floyd?
	Why didn't they just treat him on the sidewalk, right?
	I mean, he's on the street.
	Why didn't they turn him over and perform CPR?
	Essentially, the prosecution's own medical specialist says that the reason that they had to do a load and scoot is because the crowd was so aggressive, which completely undercuts the case that Shalvin should have been performing medical...
	Emergency CPR without regard for the crowd when even the EMS, not the cops, the EMS didn't even do this when they got there.
	Why?
	Because they wanted to load them into the ambulance.
	Because they wanted to get the hell out of there.
	Because things were getting ugly.
	Okay, this led to the most bizarre situation of the day over the course of the last couple of days.
	And that was the defense asked Nicole McKenzie, that officer, the medical support for MPD, they asked her, Or that excited delirium.
	Excited delirium is a condition, we've talked about it on the show, in which people who are high on drugs start having racing hearts, and then they just crash.
	Okay, we've seen this in a variety of cases across the country.
	Most recently in Rochester, New York, that seems like a case of excited delirium.
	There's a black man who was naked running around the streets in the snow, he was in the middle of a drug-induced craze, and he died in police custody.
	And that seems to be in a case of excited delirium.
	So even fentanyl, even in very small doses, can be fatal?
	Would that be accurate?
	delirium questions. Here's Nelson asking about excited delirium to McKenzie and prosecution objects because they don't want to talk about it. So even fentanyl, even in very small doses, can be fatal. Would that be accurate? I'll rephrase the question.
	Is the prosecutors object to questions about fentanyl and fentanyl overdoses and excited delirium? At which point the defense says, fine, we'll call your witness as our witness.
	That's how badly the case is going for the prosecution.
	Prosecution witnesses are now becoming defense witnesses.
	So, what is the conclusion of all of this?
	Can you watch all of that and say that it's completely unreasonable and crazy and beyond the pale for anybody to come up with reasonable doubt here?
	Frankly, I think it's difficult not to come up with reasonable doubt here, given the fact pattern in this particular case.
	It doesn't mean you have to like Chauvin.
	It doesn't mean you have to like what happened or like the tape.
	What it does mean is that in a standard of reasonable doubt, it is very difficult to argue reasonable doubt does not exist.
	And what that means is that the media are liars, and they are lying to you when they say that this is a clear-cut case.
	They are lying to you when they suggest that only American racism could require an acquittal in this particular case.
	And they are rooting for riots.
	They want violence in the streets if they continue to promulgate lies about the The certain outcome of this trial and the nature of the evidence in this case.
	If you keep saying to people that this is a clear-cut case, that only deep, abiding, systemic American racism could result in an acquittal, and you ignore all evidence to the contrary, you are stoking the flames.
	You are stoking them.
	And that's what the media are doing today.
	Alrighty, we'll be back here later today with an additional hour of content coming up soon.
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