Prosecutors revealed that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on a 14-year-old boy’s back as he struggled to breathe.
Chauvin’s attorneys asked a judge to stop prosecutors from introducing prior incidents at the trial.
In the motion filed on Monday, prosecutors said the video of prior use-of-force arrests showed that “when face with a suspect who does not immediately comply with his demands, Chauvin intentionally uses a level of unreasonable force to accomplish subdual and restraint,” the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported.
However, the defense attorney for Chauvin argued that it was irrelevant for the trial and the force used in incidents mentioned was in keeping with the then-policy on dealing with uncooperative suspects.
Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill, who ruled last week that Chauvin and three other former officers will stand trial together, has yet to rule on the motions.
A video from one incident shows Chauvin and another cop responding to a domestic assault in 2017. A mother claimed she was assaulted by her daughter and son, who were both minors.
The cops then found the son laying on the floor and on his phone. They ordered him to get up but when he refused, Chauvin used his flashlight to struck the boy in the head and grabbed him by the throat.
Prosecutors said that the footage showed him applying a neck restraint to the teen who went unconscious before he put him in a prone position with a knee on his back for 17 minutes until paramedics arrived.
They said that Chauvin held the position even after the boy told him that he could not breathe and he was in pain, and even after the mother intervened.
The prosecutors said: “As was true with the conduct with George Floyd, Chauvin rapidly escalated his use of force for a relatively minor offense.”
Chauvin is charged with second-degree manslaughter and unintentional second-degree murder after George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis.
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Replaced!