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George Floyd: What happened in the final moments of his life

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George Floyd: What happened in the final moments of his life

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George Floyd repeatedly told the police officers who detained him that he could not breathe

The US has been convulsed by nationwide protests over the death of an African-American man in police custody.

George Floyd, 46, died after being arrested by police outside a shop in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Footage of the arrest on 25 May shows a white police officer, Derek Chauvin, kneeling on Mr Floyd's neck while he was pinned to the floor.

Mr Chauvin, 44, has since been charged with murder.

Transcripts of police bodycam footage show Mr Floyd said more than 20 times he could not breathe as he was restrained by the officers.

The key events that led to Mr Floyd's death happened within just 30 minutes. Based on accounts from witnesses, video footage and official statements, here's what we know so far.

It began with a report of a fake $20 (£16.20) bill.

A report was made on the evening of 25 May, when Mr Floyd bought a pack of cigarettes from Cup Foods, a grocery store.

Believing the $20 bill he used to be counterfeit, a store employee reported it to police.

Mr Floyd had been living in Minneapolis for several years after moving there from his native Houston, Texas. He had recently been working as a bouncer in the city but, like millions of other Americans, was left jobless by the coronavirus pandemic.

Mr Floyd was a regular at Cup Foods. He was a friendly face, a pleasant customer who never caused any trouble, the store owner Mike Abumayyaleh told NBC.

But Mr Abumayyaleh was not at work on the day of the incident. In reporting the suspicious bill, his teenage employee was just following protocol.

In a call to 911, made at 20:01, the employee told the operator he had demanded the cigarettes back but "he [Floyd] doesn't want to do that", according to a transcript released by authorities.

The employee said the man appeared "drunk" and "not in control of himself", the transcript says.

Shortly after the call, at around 20:08, two police officers arrived. Mr Floyd was sitting with two other people in a car parked around the corner.

After approaching the car, one of the officers, Thomas Lane, pulled out his gun and ordered Mr Floyd to show his hands. In an account of the incident, prosecutors do not explain why Mr Lane thought it necessary to draw his gun.

Mr Lane, prosecutors said, "put his hands on Mr Floyd, and pulled him out of the car". Then Mr Floyd "actively resisted being handcuffed".

Once handcuffed, though, Mr Floyd became compliant while Mr Lane explained he was being arrested for "passing counterfeit currency".

Court transcripts from police body cameras show Mr Floyd appears co-operative at the beginning of the arrest, repeatedly apologising to the officers after they approach his parked car.

Mr Lane asks Mr Floyd to show his hands at least 10 times before ordering him to get out of the vehicle.

It was when officers tried to put Mr Floyd in their squad car that a struggle ensued.

Minnesota governor on George Floyd death: 'Thank God a young person had a camera to video it'

At about 20:14, Mr Floyd "stiffened up, fell to the ground, and told the officers he was claustrophobic", according to the report.

Mr Chauvin arrived at the scene. He and other officers were involved in a further attempt to put Mr Floyd in the police car.

During this attempt, at 20:19, Mr Chauvin pulled Mr Floyd away from the passenger side, causing him to fall to the ground, the report said.

He lay there, face down, still in handcuffs.

That's when witnesses started to film Mr Floyd, who appeared to be in a distressed state. These moments, captured on multiple mobile phones and shared widely on social media, would prove to be Mr Floyd's last.

Mr Floyd was restrained by officers, while Mr Chauvin placed his left knee between his head and neck.

For more than nine minutes, Mr Chauvin kept his knee on Mr Floyd's neck, the prosecutors say. The duration was initially given as eight minutes and 46 seconds but Minnesota prosecutors have since revised the time.

The transcripts of bodycam footage from officers Lane and J Alexander Kueng show Mr Floyd said more than 20 times he could not breathe as he was restrained. He was also pleading for his mother and begging "please, please, please".

At one point, Mr Floyd gasps: "You're going to kill me, man."

Reuters

Derek Chauvin is charged with second degree murder

Officer Chauvin replies: "Then stop talking, stop yelling. It takes heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Mr Floyd says: "Can't believe this, man. Mom, love you. Love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."

A female bystander told the police: "His nose is bleeding, come on now."

About six minutes into that period, Mr Floyd became non-responsive. In videos of the incident, this was when Mr Floyd fell silent, as bystanders urged the officers to check his pulse.

Officer Kueng did just that, checking Mr Floyd's right wrist, but "couldn't find one". Yet the other officers did not move.

At 20:27, Mr Chauvin removed his knee from Mr Floyd's neck. Motionless, Mr Floyd was rolled on to a gurney and taken to the Hennepin County Medical Center in an ambulance.

He was pronounced dead about an hour later.

In June Panorama spoke to local people to piece together the moments leading up to George Floyd's death

On the night before his death, Mr Floyd had spoken to one of his closest friends, Christopher Harris. He had advised Mr Floyd to contact a temporary jobs agency.

Forgery, he said, was out of character for Mr Floyd.

"The way he died was senseless," Harris said. "He begged for his life. He pleaded for his life. When you try so hard to put faith in this system, a system that you know isn't designed for you, when you constantly seek justice by lawful means and you can't get it, you begin to take the law into your own hands."

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George Floyd: What happened in the final moments of his life

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A timeline of events leading up to George Floyd's death has been revealed by authorities.

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Official website of the Black Lives Matter Movement

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Official website of the Black Lives Matter Movement

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https://blacklivesmatter.com/about/

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the fact of people with white skin having advantages in society that other people do not have

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(FSK 12)

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The Hate U Give | Official Trailer [HD] | 20th Century FOX

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US cities are being shaken by protests over police treatment of black people. The protests, at times violent, came after a black man was killed by rough treatment by the police, something that seems to be a long-term pattern in the US.

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Why "All lives matter" is not an appropriate reaction.

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Why "All lives matter" is not an appropriate reaction.

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Please click on the picture to read the comic by @scarecrowbar

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Yusef Salaam | The Marshall Project | The New Yorker

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We asked @JohnAmaechiOBE, psychologist, New York Times best-selling author and former NBA basketball player.

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BBC Bitesize on Instagram: "What is white privilege? 

We asked @JohnAmaechiOBE, psychologist, New York Times best-selling author and former NBA basketball player. 

👉 bbc.in/3gyhMGH"

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734 likes, 65 comments - bbcbitesize on August 5, 2020: "What is white privilege? 

We asked @JohnAmaechiOBE, psychologist, New York Times best-selling author and former NBA basketball player. 

👉...". 

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View this post on Instagram

A post shared by BBC Bitesize (@bbcbitesize)

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Protests spread around the world: A photo series

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Protests spread around the world: A photo series

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protests across the globe after george floyd's death

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Protests across the globe after George Floyd's death

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As the protests continued in the United States for a second week in response to the killing of George Floyd, people around the world began to stand up with them. From London to Pretoria to Sydney, people took to the streets to express the need for police reform and racial equality.

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Faces and voices of the Black Lives Matter protest in London 

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Faces and voices of the Black Lives Matter protest in London 

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Guardian contributor Anselm Ebulue photographed some of the protesters at a Black Lives Matter rally in London and heard their reasons for attending following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis

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'Enough is enough': the faces and voices of the Black Lives Matter protest in London

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Guardian contributor Anselm Ebulue photographed some of the protesters at a Black Lives Matter rally in London and heard their reasons for attending following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis

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White privilege is real thing... #blacklivesmatter @reaxla

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@joshandsav
White privilege is real thing... #blacklivesmatter @reaxla
♬ Check Your Privilege by Big Mamma - Big Mamma

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Erica Garner about what happened to her dad.

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Erica Garner about what happened to her dad.

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! THIS VIDEO SHOWS A SCENE THAT IS VERY HARD TO WATCH. YOU DECIDE IF YOU WANT TO SEE IT. (The arrest of Erica´s dad)

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Erica Garner | We Are Witnesses | The Marshall Project

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(FSK 16)

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Song "White Privilege II" by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Jamila Woods. 

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Song "White Privilege II" by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Jamila Woods. 

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You can read the lyrics while listening to the song here:
https://genius.com/Macklemore-and-ryan-lewis-white-privilege-ii-lyrics

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MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS FEAT. JAMILA WOODS - WHITE PRIVILEGE II

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Fixing the system from inside - A police officer takes action

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Fixing the system from inside - A police officer takes action

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Edwin Raymond | The Marshall Project | The New Yorker

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There's a moment near the end of Angie Thomas's debut novel, "The Hate U Give," when fiction and reality collide.

The narrator - a 16-year-old girl named Starr, who is in mourning and shock after a police officer shoots her friend - recalls the names of African-American victims of racial profiling in recent years, shot in many cases by officers: "Oscar. Aiyana. Trayvon. Rekia. Michael. Eric. Tamir. John. Ezell. Sandra. Freddie. Alton. Philando."

Ms. Thomas wrote the novel, which became an instant best seller, partly as a response to those deaths.

"The Hate U Give" is one of several recent and pending young adult novels that grapple with racial profiling and the emotional, social and political aftershocks that communities endure in the wake of police violence.

Below are six books for young readers that address police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement.

Jason Reynolds still vividly recalls when his mother gave him "the talk" about how to behave around police officers. "That talk has saved my life many a time," Mr. Reynolds said.

In 2014, after an officer shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., Mr. Reynolds and the author Brendan Kiely decided to team up to write "All American Boys," a young adult novel. In it, a quiet and artistic teenager is shopping for chips at a bodega when a police officer mistakes him for a shoplifter and assaults him.

Mr. Reynolds and Mr. Kiely assumed no one would publish the book, and planned to put it online for free if they couldn't sell it.

"When Black Lives Matter started, it was polarizing," Mr. Reynolds said. "Does any publishing company want to bring forth static around something so fresh?"

In fact, "All American Boys," which came out in 2015, became a commercial hit, selling more than 120,000 copies.

Jay Coles was 18 when he started writing his debut novel, "Tyler Johnson Was Here," about a boy whose twin brother is a victim of police brutality. While the characters were fictional, Mr. Coles said he had been motivated to write the novel after Trayvon Martin, 17, was killed in Florida. "I put myself in a deep depression while writing it," he said.

A few months ago, Mr. Coles, who grew up in Indianapolis and is now a senior in college, sold the book to Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, which will publish it next spring.

"I want people to leave with the understanding that it's O.K. to be angry and loud when it comes to seeking justice," he said.

In Nic Stone's debut novel, "Dear Martin," Justyce, a smart, ambitious black high school scholarship student at an elite prep school, gets caught up in a heated exchange between his best friend and an off-duty police officer, who shoots at them. In the frenzied media coverage that follows, Justyce is stunned to find himself described as a gang member.

His story is interspersed with letters he writes to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., lamenting how little race relations have improved since the civil rights movement. Crown Books for Young Readers will publish the novel this fall.

Ms. Stone, 31, who lives in Atlanta and has two young sons, said she had written the book after a string of high-profile shootings of unarmed African-American teenagers left her feeling gutted.

"When it comes to the heavier issues, fiction gives you this bubble, where you can grapple with things without somebody in your face," she said.

In this forthcoming young adult graphic novel written by Tony Medina, a poet and prolific children's books author, a teenager named Alfonso Jones is killed by an off-duty police officer, then watches from the afterlife as his family struggles to bring the shooter to justice.

The story will be illustrated by John Jennings, who illustrated the graphic novel adaptation of Octavia Butler's "Kindred," and Stacey Robinson, who works with Mr. Jennings as part of the collaborative team "Black Kirby" It will be published this fall by Tu Books, an imprint of Lee & Low Books.

Jewell Parker Rhodes, an award-winning children's book author, has never shied away from emotionally challenging subjects. Her previous novels have addressed national tragedies like Hurricane Katrina and the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Her next novel, "Ghost Boys," which Little, Brown Books for Young Readers will publish next spring, is a surreal tale that tackles recent police shootings and the country's long history of racially motivated crimes.

The narrative unfolds from the point of view of a ghost - a young black boy who is shot by a white police officer and observes what happens after his death. In the afterlife, the boy meets the ghosts of other black boys, including the spirit of Emmett Till. Because of the book's violent premise and its proximity to real events, the novel is being recommended for slightly older middle-grade readers, ages 10 and up.

"Children and teens are reading and hearing about this in the news all the time, and fiction gives them an entry point to understanding it better and helping them to empathize with all sides," said Alvina Ling, the vice president and editor in chief of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.

The young adult novel "How It Went Down," which was written by Kekla Magoon and came out in 2014, explores the aftermath of a shooting from multiple perspectives. After a white man shoots Tariq Johnson, a 16-year-old African-American boy, witnesses offer conflicting accounts of what happened - whether Tariq was armed, and what precipitated the violence.

In a review, School Library Journal said the book "raises such difficult, thorny issues and doesn't try to offer any easy answers."

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Where Fiction and Reality Collide: Books and Black Lives Matter (Published 2017)

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There's a moment near the end of Angie Thomas's debut novel, "The Hate U Give," when fiction and reality collide. The narrator - a 16-year-old girl named Starr, who is in mourning and shock after a police officer shoots her friend - recalls the names of African-American victims of racial profiling in recent years, shot in many cases by officers: "Oscar.