George Floyd
- Thread starter TULSARISING
- Start date
I'm not an attorney, but basically they can stack the charges. They convict you of all three, or more, then the years become additive. 40 for 2nd degree murder plus 25 for 3rd then for some reason they add or subtract from there. Manslaughter is 4 years. Pretty soon it adds up. If it is your first time, 25 years becomes 12.5 if you have no previous record.
I'm not joking.
I'm not joking.
I'm glad he was convicted on at least 1 of them. Chauvin showed complete disregard for human life.
The real disgusting thing is that he seemed to do what he did just to show that he didn’t need to do what the passers by were asking him to do. It was a power trip. That’s the biggest problem I have with our police force is that they see themselves as authoritative superiors rather than citizens tasked with a certain job.
I thought the same thing , I do believe we need police and if someone is resisting arrest, I believe they should be able to use REASONABLE force to get them arrested. I don’t believe they should be able to harass people for no reason. We do have to remember though the job they have , they deal with some of the lowest types of people, such as murderers , rapists, thieves , ect. Also remember they put their lives on the line every day, remember Officer Craig Johnson was murdered during a traffic stop , we do need to stop acting like criminals are victims when they get shot because they did something to threaten a life of an officer or a civilian. The George Floyd case however was just murder and I’m glad they found him guilty.
Soldiers put their lives on he line everyday for much lower pay and much lower benefits and they do so while being in more danger and in a foreign land where they typically don’t speak the language.
Most officers aren’t in a comparable amount of danger on a day to day basis but they do tend to act more irrationally in stressful situations and with much less discipline.
I think there are some justified police involved killings (that girl in Ohio yedterday who was trying to stab someone when offers were on the scene is one such person) but there are also many criminals and situations that officers needlessly escalate to the point that someone who doesn’t deserve to die (even though they might have been committing criminal even sometimes violent acts) ends up dead instead of sitting in front of a judge and jury, and the offending officers should be punished for such transgressions.
The Chauvin case was pretty cut and dry. We don't allow vigilante justice in this country and that's what was being delivered by Mr. Chauvin, whether he intended to kill or just to "show who is boss." There are also cases of clear criminal negligence such as Robert Bates and that officer last week in Minnesota who used a gun instead of a taser. The much trickier situations are the Terrance Crutcher ones, where you have to determine whether an officer had a reasonable fear that required deadly force in self defense. I don't think we've really resolved that in society with the Chauvin verdict and it is hard for me to see any easy answers in those situations.
While I agree that the Chauvin guilty verdict was the right one, I am still interested in how one death can result in three charges that appear to be basically restatements of the same action: unintentional death, manslaughter, 3rd degree murder. Doesn't that sound one can be punished for the same crime three times by the same jurisdiction? So there seems to be a legal distinction involved that I don't understand. From what I read the differences have to do with the jury's interpretation of Chauvin's state of mind.
I think there should have been some sort of a misuse of the public trust charge. Dont quite know how to phrase that or if it even exists in any justisdiction, but it’s a more serious offense when it is someone given certain privileges and expected to uphold the law. Any normal person would have been (or at least could have been) forceably removed from Floyd’s throat. Since Chauvin was a cop he couldn’t be physically obstructed because it would have resulted in a bogus charge for the person trying to save someone’s life. Police have to be held to a higher standard of care for adhering to the law than normal people. (It would be similar to a cop speeding whilst off duty in a cop car and then getting into an injury causing wreck. Normal people can’t easily arrest them for crimes, so there have to be stricter punishments for committing the same crimes. )
No question abut higher standard, but still curious about three charges that all say much the same thing and differ superficially only in intent. Not so much about his case as in how the law works in general.
From what I understand....Minnesota allows the DA to “stack” charges related to the same act. This allows them to only prove one of the charges in order to obtain a conviction. If the DA proves all three (this case) then the jury can find the defendant guilty on all three. This obviously makes the DA’s job much easier imo. The defendant will only be sentenced on the most serious charge. The lesser two are basically “thrown away”. I’m not a criminal guy but that is my understanding of Minnesota law.
That was sort of my guess going in, but some media reports post conviction estimated the 3 charges could run consecutively. I guess that's what judges are for.
justice was done. now where is the emotion for the police who are assaulted, shot and murdered every day keeping us safe.
Charges cannot be consecutive by statute. That’s confusion generated from idiots l/pundits who don’t know the law and spouting off for money without checking. It’s different in other states.
The “stacked” charges are the result of some hyper defendant protective statutes and case law designed to prevent double jeopardy but also consecutive prosecutions for the same incident. (You are not guilty of burglary of your neighbors mower but the cops found it in your garage so they file a second action charging petit theft in a lower court, etc.). The State is required to specifically charge all potential crimes for which he could be sentenced to custody. That way there’s no surprises to the defendant and a fair trial and you don’t get a prosecution that falls apart and they start presenting evidence in the middle of the trial trying to at least get a lesser included under an alternative theory.
The “stacked” charges are the result of some hyper defendant protective statutes and case law designed to prevent double jeopardy but also consecutive prosecutions for the same incident. (You are not guilty of burglary of your neighbors mower but the cops found it in your garage so they file a second action charging petit theft in a lower court, etc.). The State is required to specifically charge all potential crimes for which he could be sentenced to custody. That way there’s no surprises to the defendant and a fair trial and you don’t get a prosecution that falls apart and they start presenting evidence in the middle of the trial trying to at least get a lesser included under an alternative theory.
I don’t like the law from a defendants point of view as it allows the DA to over charge and prosecute someone hoping they can get a more serious conviction all the while knowing they have multiple other charges the jury can fall back on. I assume this would also help the DA in plea bargains as they can charge someone with say second degree murder when the elements are present for only manslaughter.
I think I would probably disagree with this. 99% of the time there was very little risk from any person that I encountered, mostly because it was always me and at least 10 to 12 other people and three strykers with mounted .50s and MK19s plus a blimp overhead watching everyone's move for miles. And we basically were just cops in Afghanistan.
A cop here is almost always at some level of elevated risk because they're usually alone or with one or two other people when they pull someone over or arrest them. I think they probably have a much harder job than I was asked to do.
Also remember that only 10% of US military personnel serve in actual combat zones.
And a pretty surprising low percentage actually engage in the combat.
And "combat" means ied 90% of the time and sniper 9% of the time these days. Since about 2011/2012 someone within 300 meters of you trying to kill you has been pretty rare if you're not a seal because offensive operations stopped. America hasn't really been at war in almost a decade.
I quit watching the news because they take sides and politicize their reports.
now my favorite TV shows and sports have drunk the cool aid.
now my favorite TV shows and sports have drunk the cool aid.
It’s very infrequent that cops in the states are running over IED’s or being sniped at. The point of the anecdote isn’t that people are or aren’t in active combat at this very moment, it’s that they have been in the recent past, and they weren’t treated as handsomely as many policemen are from day to day, and they had a more dangerous job. Not only that but they had higher expectations and stricter rules for escalation of force.
Typically, under 75 cops are killed in any given year due to felonious acts. Between 2003 and 2009 we saw on average 624 combat deaths per year in Iraq.
Here’s a fun fact, being a law enforcement officer is actually the #22 most dangerous job in the country. It lands behind garbage man, small engine mechanic, highway worker, construction workers, roofers, and crossing guards. I don’t here anyone out there incessantly reminding the public how much of a sacrifice our local crossing guards are making on a daily basis.
Heck, it’s more fatal to be a farmer or a roughneck than it is to be a cop.
I believe you misinterpreted my statistic. It’s not that only 10% are involved in combat zones at any one time it’s 10% of US military personnel are ever involved in combat. The actual statistic is roughly 60% are ever deployed and of those only 10-20% are involved in combat activities.
Are you talking to me? I never said anything regarding that statistic. I’m aware that a small number see combat compared to the overall size of the military.
Death counts don’t lie. Cops rarely get killed. They act like every person they encounter is a safety hazard for them...which might actually improve their statistics, but it also harms the life expectancy of some of their suspects.
That doesn’t excuse the lack of discipline that many cops show when they make certain encounters... especially ones with individuals who are already apprehended, or have shown no imminent threat to anyone’s life and are trying to get away.
What were your rules of engagement in Afghanistan? What had to happen before you could exchange fire?
I would be willing to bet if there were cameras following around our troops in Afghanistan you would find many instances where soldiers fire their weapons in questionable situations.
That said....for the life of me I don’t understand why we don’t have PSAs advising people how to act then stopped by the police. Almost all of these situations could be avoided by simply following basic rules. This in no way implies that police should be free to fire their weapons in non life threatening situations. Both sides need to make changes.
That said....for the life of me I don’t understand why we don’t have PSAs advising people how to act then stopped by the police. Almost all of these situations could be avoided by simply following basic rules. This in no way implies that police should be free to fire their weapons in non life threatening situations. Both sides need to make changes.
I am more sympathetic to police because of the incredible number of guns in the population, injecting tension into every encounter. Too many guns are still a root cause.
“Defund the police” has to be the worst, most polarizing messaging for an important issue in a long time. Militarizing the police with DoD weaponry because of the 20 M ARs out there sends an equally bad message, but those ARs are out there.
“Defund the police” has to be the worst, most polarizing messaging for an important issue in a long time. Militarizing the police with DoD weaponry because of the 20 M ARs out there sends an equally bad message, but those ARs are out there.
I agree that some people don’t act correctly around police, but I have seen many times where police escalate verbal confrontations when people are just trying to comply. (That’s not to say that all cops are that way but they are the ones who are getting paid and receiving training in how an officer should behave with any civilian, criminal or not)
Some of the apprehension tactics also make it extremely difficult to comply. It’s really hard not to struggle when you legitimately can’t breath, or your arm is being twisted so hard behind you that it will likely cause medical trauma. Some reactions are just intrinsic to your body trying to maintain itself.
The real problem is that there are good cops and bad cops. There shouldn’t be nearly as many bad cops as there are. For a profession that’s tasked with inherently not being unlawful, they do an awful lot of unlawful or reckless things. It would be like if I saw 1/15 safety men on job sites snorting coke and showing up drunk to work. They shouldn’t be safety men.
Last edited:
I didn’t say it excuses anything. You can go read my comments over the past year and see if my comments about dickhead cops excuse them for anything. I was merely responding to the idea that soldiers deal with higher risk and behave better, which I disagree with because the threats are different. A personal, in your face, risk is different than worrying if that stack of rocks means you’re about to step on an IED. I’d hate to think about how many unarmed people soldier would accidentally kill if they had to drive around Afghanistan detaining people solo. It’s a risk you just never have to deal with and it think it’s probably more stressful.
Careful. You’re not allowed to mention that absurd public service employment protections are really one of the root causes of misconduct and fraud by public employees protected by their unions.
