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Thousands of children across the US attend schools that bear the names of Confederate leaders who fought to preserve slavery and White supremacy in America.

More than 240 schools across the US are named in honor of Confederate leaders, according to the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI). Approximately half of those schools serve students that are predominantly Black or nonwhite.

Many schools were given Confederate-related names in the 1950s and 1960s as part of a coordinated effort by governors, legislators and White leaders to push back against racial integration in public schools, the EJI said.

Confederate-named schools are located in 17 states, with some being found in Georgia, Alabama and Texas. The schools range from public elementary to high schools, and the majority of the schools are located in the South from North Carolina to Texas.

Jefferson Davis Elementary School in Greenwood, Mississippi is named after the Confederate President who led the charge to preserve slavery, and nearly all of the students who attend the school are African American, according to the EJI.

Stonewall Jackson Elementary in Plant City, Florida, is named after General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, who led the Confederate Army and bought and sold slaves. The EJI says that the school is made up of 85% nonwhite students.

The Truth About Confederate-Named Schools

As these public schools bearing the name of Confederate leaders opened their doors to Black people, many White students fled to private schools, leading to more nonwhites making up the majority of the student body today, the EJI says.

More than 30 schools in the US have been renamed since 2014 in order to eliminate any link to Confederacy, according to the EJI.

The Montgomery County Board of Education voted to rename three schools - Robert E. Lee High School, Jefferson Davis High School and Sidney Lanier High School - amid national protests in July.

However, many schools still bear the names of Confederate leaders, and the EJI says this could lead some young students to "embrace the names, likenesses, and symbols of men who fought a brutal war against the US in order to preserve White supremacy."

Since the death of George Floyd and protests flared across the US, at least 45 Confederate symbols have been removed or relocated from public places, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

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More than 240 schools in US are named after a Confederate leader. About half serve majority Black or nonwhite students | CNN

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Thousands of children across the US attend schools that bear the names of Confederate leaders who fought to preserve slavery and White supremacy in America. More than 240 schools across the US are named in honor of Confederate leaders, according to the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).

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The Truth About Confederate-Named Schools

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DOC 1 : George Floyd' s  arrest                                    

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DOC 1 : George Floyd' s  arrest                                    

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Watch A Minute-To-Minute Breakdown Leading Up To George Floyd's Deadly Arrest | NBC News NOW

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The family of George Floyd and their attorneys said Friday that the sentencing of Derek Chauvin offers closure, accountability - and a step toward healing for both the family and the nation.

They also demanded political action for lasting change.

"For once, a police officer who wrongly took the life of a Black man was held to account. While this shouldn't be exceptional, tragically it is. Day after day, year after year, police kill Black people without consequence. But today, with Chauvin's sentence, we take a significant step forward - something that was unimaginable a very short time ago," said the family's statement, released by civil rights attorney Ben Crump.

But in an interview with NPR, Floyd's brother Philonise Floyd said he was disappointed. "I just think he should have receive the maximum amount. This is just accountability. I think this was a slap on the wrist. A lot of people are looking at this and they want to know what's going on with America, but at the same time, he did get sentenced, so that was a good thing."

Chauvin, a former Minneapolis Police officer, was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison on Friday for the murder of George Floyd on Memorial Day last year.

The family members say that they now wish to see Chauvin convicted on the federal charges pending against him and that the other three former officers charged will "face consequences for their actions."

The family's formal statement struck a note of progress.

"It's important to acknowledge how far we've come. Those who raised their voices to demand justice for George Floyd need to know that their activism made a difference," the family said.

The family pointed not only to Chauvin's conviction and sentencing but also to reforms made around the country, including restrictions on chokeholds and improved training and protocols.

But Floyd's relatives said they don't want the change to end there.

"We need this sentence to usher in a new era of accountability that transforms how Black people are treated by police. To achieve that," they said, "we need the U.S. Senate to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act without further delay."

The U.S. House of Representatives, led by Democrats, passed the measure in March. Senators announced preliminary bipartisan agreement on police reform Thursday night, though specifics of the plan were not immediately clear.

President Biden had said he hoped Congress would pass the reform effort by the first anniversary of Floyd's death.

A Minnesota judge sentenced former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin to 22 1/2 years in prison Friday for the murder of George Floyd.

Judge Peter Cahill wrote that part of the mission of the Minneapolis Police Department is to give citizens "voice and respect."

"Mr. Chauvin, rather than pursuing the MPD mission, treated Mr. Floyd without respect and denied him the dignity owed to all human beings and which he certainly would have extended to a friend or neighbor. In the Court's view, 270 months, which amounts to an additional ten years over the presumptive 150-month sentence, is the appropriate sentence."

Read Cahill's entire sentencing order and memorandum for Chauvin below.

Chauvin, 45, was convicted in April of all three charges he faced - second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

He was sentenced only on the first of the charges, the most serious, as is typical in Minnesota.

Cahill said Chauvin's crime included four aggravating factors: that Chauvin abused a position of trust and authority as a police officer, that he treated Floyd with "particular cruelty," that he committed the crime as part of a group with at least three other people and that children were present during the commission of the offense.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - A judge on Friday rejected former Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin' s request for a new trial in George Floyd 's death.

Judge Peter Cahill said defense attorney Eric Nelson didn't show that the court abused its discretion and denied Chauvin the right to a fair trial. The ruling came hours before Chauvin was to be sentenced for murder in Floyd's death.

Requests for new trials after a conviction are routine but rarely granted.

Chauvin, 45, pinned Floyd to a Minneapolis street for about 9 1/2 minutes on May 25, 2020, ignoring the Black man's cries of "I can't breathe" and the shouts of onlookers. Bystander video of Floyd's death sparked protests in Minneapolis, some violent, and quickly spread around the world.

Chauvin attorney Eric Nelson argued that intense publicity around Floyd's death tainted the jury pool and that the trial should have been moved away from Minneapolis. He also offered a range of other arguments, all dismissed by prosecutors, who said Chauvin was fairly convicted.

Cahill also rejected Nelson's request for a hearing into possible juror misconduct. The defense accused juror Brandon Mitchell of not being candid during jury selection because he didn't mention his participation in a march last summer to honor the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Prosecutors countered that Mitchell had been open about his views in a jury questionnaire and during the questioning of potential jurors.

The judge ruled the defense didn't show any evidence of juror misconduct either during trial or during jury selection that warranted an evidentiary hearing.

Chauvin is expected to appeal his conviction.

MINNEAPOLIS - Prosecutors are seeking a 30-year sentence for the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of murder in George Floyd's death, but a defense attorney is asking that Derek Chauvin be sentenced to probation and time already served, according to court documents filed Wednesday.

Chauvin is scheduled to be sentenced June 25 following his conviction on murder and manslaughter charges. Judge Peter Cahill previously ruled there were aggravating factors in Floyd's death. That gives him the discretion to sentence Chauvin above the range recommended by state guidelines, which top out at 15 years.

Prosecutors said Chauvin's actions were egregious and a sentence of 30 years would "properly account for the profound impact of Defendant's conduct on the victim, the victim's family, and the community." They said that Chauvin's actions "shocked the Nation's conscience."

"No sentence can undo Mr. Floyd's death, and no sentence can undo the trauma Defendant's actions have inflicted. But the sentence the Court imposes must show that no one is above the law, and no one is below it," prosecutors wrote. "Defendant's sentence must hold him fully accountable for his reprehensible conduct."

Defense attorney Eric Nelson cited Chauvin's age, lack of a criminal record, and support from family and friends in requesting a sentence of probation and time served. He said Chauvin, 45, was the product of a "broken" system.

Mark Osler, a former federal prosecutor and now a professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, said it's not unusual for attorneys to make these kinds of requests as a sort of "opening offer." He said there is zero chance that Chauvin will get probation, and prosecutors are also unlikely to get the 30 years they are requesting.

He said Nelson's attempts to paint Chauvin as a good fit for probation and a law-abiding citizen will probably face "ferocious push-back from the government," given Chauvin is also charged with tax evasion. He added that Nelson's reference to Chauvin being the product of a broken system is "fascinating - most Americans seem to think that Chauvin embodies what is broken about our system of criminal justice."

Chauvin was convicted in April of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter for pressing his knee against Floyd's neck for about 9 1/2 minutes as the Black man said he couldn't breathe and went motionless. Floyd's death, captured on widely seen bystander video, set off demonstrations around the United States and beyond as protesters demanded changes in policing.

Even though Chauvin was found guilty of three counts, he'll only be sentenced on the most serious one - second-degree murder. Under Minnesota sentencing guidelines, with no criminal record he faces a presumptive sentence of 12 1/2 years on that count. Cahill can sentence him to as little as 10 years and eight months or as much as 15 years and stay within the guideline range.

But prosecutors asked for what is known as an upward departure, saying there were several aggravating factors that warranted a higher sentence. Cahill agreed, finding Chauvin treated Floyd with particular cruelty, abused his position of authority as a police officer, committed his crime as part of a group of three or more people, and that he pinned Floyd down in the presence of children.

Prosecutors said that even one of those factors would warrant the higher sentence.

Nelson wrote that while this incident painted Chauvin as a "dangerous man," he has served his community as an officer and has a loving family and close friends. He also disputed the court's finding that aggravating factors existed, saying there is no evidence that Chauvin's assault on Floyd included gratuitous infliction of pain or cruelty.

"Here, Mr. Chauvin was unaware that he was even committing a crime. In fact, in his mind, he was simply performing his lawful duty in assisting other officers in the arrest of George Floyd," Nelson wrote, adding that Chauvin's offense can be best described as an error made in good faith based on his experience and the training he received - and was not the intentional commission of a crime.

"In spite of the notoriety surrounding this case, the Court must look to the facts. They all point to the single most important fact: Mr. Chauvin did not intend to cause George Floyd's death. He believed he was doing his job," he wrote.

No matter what sentence Chauvin gets, in Minnesota it's presumed that a defendant with good behavior will serve two-thirds of the penalty in prison and the rest on supervised release, commonly known as parole.

Nelson is also seeking a new trial for Chauvin - which is a fairly routine request after a conviction. He argued extensive pretrial publicity tainted the jury pool and denied Chauvin his right to a fair trial. He also said Cahill also abused his authority when he declined defense requests to move the trial out of Minneapolis and sequester the jury. And, he said the state committed prosecutorial misconduct.

Nelson is also asking for a hearing to investigate whether there was juror misconduct. Nelson alleged that an alternate juror who made public comments indicated she felt pressured to render a guilty verdict, and another juror who deliberated did not follow jury instructions and was not candid during jury selection. That juror, Brandon Mitchell, did not mention that he had participated in an Aug. 28 march in Washington, D.C., to honor Martin Luther King Jr.

Nelson alleged that Mitchell made comments to the media that indicated he based his verdict on outside influence.

Prosecutors have a week to submit a written response to those arguments.

Chauvin has also been indicted on federal charges alleging he violated Floyd's civil rights, as well as the civil rights of a 14-year-old he restrained in a 2017 arrest. The three other former officers involved in Floyd's death were also charged with federal civil rights violations; they await trial in state court on aiding and abetting counts.

A federal trial date has not been set. Federal prosecutors are asking for more time to prepare for trial, saying the case is complex because of the sheer volume of evidence and the separate but coordinated state and federal investigations.

The Justice Department has filed federal criminal charges against Derek Chauvin, accusing the former police officer of using excessive force and violating the civil rights of George Floyd. Floyd died after Chauvin pressed on his neck for more than nine minutes on the pavement outside a convenience store last year in Minneapolis.

Three other former officers on the scene that day - Thomas Lane, J. Alexander Kueng and Tou Thao - have been charged federally in connection with Floyd's death. Two of the men, Kueng and Thao, are accused of failing to intervene to stop Chauvin. All three face a charge of failing to provide medical care with "deliberate indifference" to Floyd's suffering. They already are preparing for a state trial in August.

Chauvin also faces a separate federal indictment related to a 2017 incident where he allegedly used a neck restraint "without legal justification" on a 14-year-old and beat the teenager in the head with a flashlight.

Federal civil rights prosecutors from Washington worked hand in hand with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Minnesota to build the case.

Such federal charges are rare, in part because it is difficult to meet the high legal bar they require. To succeed, prosecutors must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Chauvin acted "willfully" to deprive Floyd of his civil rights and used force that was "constitutionally unreasonable."

In those cases, officers can argue in their defense that they acted out of fear, panic or even poor judgment, some of which featured in Chauvin's defense to state charges in a trial that concluded with a conviction on all counts last month. Chauvin has moved for a new trial, citing alleged jury misconduct and pretrial publicity.

The video of Floyd, who was Black, pleading for his life and crying for his late mother reverberated around the globe, with people who watched it taking to the streets in the summer of 2020 to protest police brutality and racial injustice. Floyd's young daughter met President Biden on the campaign trial, and he often repeats her statement that her "daddy changed the world."

The case is yet another demonstration of the Biden administration's emphasis on civil rights. In the Trump administration, Attorney General Bill Barr declined to approve a plea deal with Chauvin after Floyd's death, reasoning that he preferred to cede that ground to local authorities and that the situation in Minneapolis was incendiary enough.

But the U.S. Justice Department has weighed in with federal charges in other cases, including the brutal police beating of Rodney King in California in 1991; the murder of nine Black parishioners during a Bible study at a historic church in Charleston, S.C., in 2015; and the death of a young woman protesting against hate groups in a vehicular assault in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017.

The current attorney general, Merrick Garland, told ABC News he was "shocked" by the video of Floyd's death and saddened by the persistence of racial discrimination in housing, education and the justice system.

The new federal criminal cases are separate from an ongoing civil rights investigation Garland announced April 21 that will examine whether Minneapolis police have engaged in a "pattern or practice" of discrimination, including excessive force and mistreatment of people with disabilities. Authorities in Minnesota have pledged to cooperate with that civil investigation, which could take months to pursue.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison welcomed the new federal criminal charges. "The federal government has a responsibility to protect the civil rights of every American and to pursue justice to the fullest extent of federal law," Ellison said. "Federal prosecution for the violation of George Floyd's civil rights is entirely appropriate."

NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson said the charges are a "step in the right direction" but that "urgent reforms" are needed. The NAACP has been working with a bipartisan group of lawmakers on a bill named after Floyd that would create a national registry of police misconduct, among other things.

"No police officer is above the law, nor should they ever be shielded from accountability," Johnson said.

Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin who was convicted last month of murdering George Floyd filed court documents for a new trial on Tuesday.

His attorney, Eric Nelson, petitioned the court, alleging that Chauvin's constitutional rights were violated when Judge Peter Cahill refused to change the venue of the trial, and that the pretrial publicity deprived the officer of a fair trial.

Nelson also cites "prosecutorial and jury misconduct; errors of law at trial; and a verdict that is contrary to law."

Chauvin, who jammed his knee into Floyd's neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds as the Black man lay in a prone position on the ground, was convicted on one count of second-degree murder, one count of third-degree murder and one count of second-degree manslaughter.

Floyd's killing, which was sparked by an initial call to police over the alleged use of a counterfeit $20 bill, was witnessed in real time in broad daylight by about a dozen people on May 25, 2020. They pleaded with Chauvin and three other Minneapolis police officers to release Floyd as he struggled to breathe. A video of the 45-year-old's death, as he cried for his mother and begged bystanders to tell his family he loved them, quickly went viral and ignited a national reckoning on police violence and systemic racism even before the trial commenced.

Throughout the latest four-page court document, Nelson argues that the court abused its discretion by keeping the high-profile trial - one that became a national referendum on Black justice in America- in the same city where Floyd was killed and protests had drawn national attention.

The publicity leading up to the proceedings, Nelson said, allowed for "intimidation of the defense's expert witnesses, from which the jury was not insulated." Nelson suggested that such fallout may have a long-lasting "chilling effect" on the ability of defendants in other high-profile cases to obtain expert witnesses in the future.

"The publicity here was so pervasive and so prejudicial before and during this trial that it amounted to a structural defect in the proceedings," Nelson wrote.

The blame for Chauvin's alleged unfair treatment also extended to the jury, the court and the prosecution, according to Nelson. The filing asks Cahill for a hearing to impeach the disgraced officer's verdict, in part, on the grounds that the 12 jurors "felt threatened or intimidated, felt race-based pressure during the proceedings." As a result, he said, jurors were left vulnerable to intimidation and potential retribution.

The jury was significantly less white than Hennepin County itself; the 12 jurors included four Black people, two people who identify as multiracial and six white people.

According to the motion, the court abused its discretion in the following instances:

When it failed to sequester the jury for the duration of the trial, or in the least, admonish them to avoid all media

When it permitted the State to present cumulative evidence with respect to use of force

When it failed to order that a record be made of the numerous sidebars that occurred during the trial

When it submitted instructions to the jury that failed to accurately reflect the law with respect to second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder, and authorized use of force

Chauvin, a 19-year law enforcement veteran, is now awaiting sentencing, which could come as early as this month or sometime in June. State sentencing guidelines recommend 12.5 years in prison for a conviction on unintentional second-degree murder for someone with no criminal history. But prosecutors say they want an additional penalty, called an enhancement, because of certain aggravating factors. Ultimately, it will be Cahill's decision.

It is rare for police officers to be convicted for their conduct while wearing a uniform. As NPR's Carrie Johnson reported, "Some studies show only seven police officers since 2005 have been convicted of murder for their actions on the job. That's even though about 1,000 or 1,100 people a year die at the hands of police."

It took the jury in Chauvin's case about 10 hours over a two-day period to return a guilty verdict for the white police officer.

MINNEAPOLIS - Derek Chauvin's murder trial was the first Minnesota criminal trial to be broadcast live on television. It won't be the last.

Some in the Minnesota legal system were apprehensive about allowing the live broadcast of Chauvin's trial in the killing of George Floyd, but the video feed had no major problems and bolstered the public's understanding of the trial, Minnesota Public Radio News reported.

A spokesperson for the Hennepin County court system said an order from Judge Peter Cahill to allow the live broadcast will still apply to the August trial of the other three former Minneapolis officers charged in Floyd's death, Thomas Lane, J. Alexander Kueng and Tou Thao.

Cahill ordered the trials to be broadcast live because of the intense global interest in the case and limited courthouse space because of the pandemic.

Minnesota court rules usually ban cameras at criminal trials unless both sides agree to them. Although Chauvin's attorney quickly welcomed the live broadcast, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison had argued against allowing the live broadcast because he said it could intimidate witnesses.

But a week after the jury found Chauvin guilty, Ellison told WCCO-TV that the live broadcast "went pretty well" and that he was grateful the judge allowed juvenile witnesses to testify off camera.

Cahill also barred jurors' faces from being televised.

Hennepin County Chief Judge Toddrick Barnette said he was also a longtime skeptic of cameras in the courtroom. He met with journalists and media attorneys ahead of the trial and worked closely with Court TV, which operated the cameras and provided its video feed to other news outlets.

"Over time, I felt more comfortable that they were really interested in the integrity of the process, and worked very hard to make sure there were no violations of Judge Cahill's order," Barnette said.

Barnette said one of the biggest benefits of televising the trial was that the public learned about the process, from jury selection to the final verdict. Chauvin was convicted last week of second- and third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. He'll be sentenced June 25.

As former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin awaits sentencing after his conviction on three counts of murder in the death of George Floyd, policymakers in Minneapolis are trying to figure out how to improve policing.

Concurrently, the Justice Department has launched an investigation into the city's police department to address possible patterns of discrimination and excessive force.

"We very much welcome the investigation," Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told All Things Considered on Wednesday. "I was on the phone with the DOJ earlier today, and I believe strongly that it's an opportunity to continue working towards that deep change and accountability that we know that we need in the Minneapolis department."

The MPD has been under scrutiny for the last year, but Black people's grievances against the department go back decades. Now, the city council is mulling giving voters an option on the ballot this November to replace the police department outright with a new entity based around public health.

While Frey doesn't see eye to eye with advocates of the #DefundThePolice movement, he was forthright about the need to significantly reform the police and Minneapolis at large.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Interview Highlights
In your view has there been a pattern of unlawful, unconstitutional policing in Minneapolis?
We've certainly had issues in our Minneapolis Police Department, like many other police departments throughout our country. And now I feel like we've reached a point when people are pushing very clearly for change. We're making sure that the precision of our actions right now match the precision of the harm that has been inflicted over quite some time. And let's be clear, we've got a mandate right now for that change. These cycles of trauma and tragedy, they're not going to interrupt themselves, so we need to act.
Let's stay with the changes that you would like to see happen. What are your prioritizing?
There have been a litany of changes that have already taken place. There are also more changes that are underway and that need to happen. Our Black community continues to demand these changes of the highest order. And that's everything from the George Floyd Justice and Policing Act at the federal level, that's state law changes and we need safety beyond policing as well. Noting that not every single 911 one call needs response from an officer with a gun.
The Minneapolis City Council is working to give voters an option on the ballot to eliminate the police department. Now in past you have not supported moves like that. Where are you now?
I very much support a comprehensive strategy to public safety that includes the aspects that I just talked about, whether it's a mental health co-responder approach or social workers or individuals that have experience working with those experiencing homelessness. That's important and that doesn't need to have response from an officer. The part where we diverge is twofold. One, I do not believe we should be defunding/abolishing the police department in a way that we would be significantly reducing the already very low number of officers that we have on a per capita basis in Minneapolis. And two, I don't support a move that would have the head of public safety or the chief of police report to 14 individuals. I believe that that diminishes accountability and it clearly diminishes the ability to provide clear direction.
How are you thinking about helping your city heal?
Our city has gone through a barrage of trauma over this last year, in many respects culminating in the trial and the verdict that we just saw yesterday. This is a moment perhaps centuries in the making - a centuries in the making reckoning around racial justice. And also, I want to note that we don't want to shortchange that moment in a way that we limit the conversations to simply aspects of policing. The conversation needs to be about economic inclusion. It needs to be about rights in housing. We need to be making clear moves towards racial equity in every shape and form, towards justice and to healing. And that can't simply focus on policy reforms and policing itself. Of course, that's part of it. But we need to go well beyond.
Karen Zamora, Elena Burnett and Courtney Dorning produced and edited the audio interview. Mano Sundaresan adapted it for Web.

The murder conviction of Derek Chauvin could represent "a huge paradigm shift," if three other Minneapolis officers charged in George Floyd's death are also convicted, says Nekima Levy Armstrong, a civil rights attorney and activist in Minneapolis.

"Before yesterday's verdict, Minnesota officers had been sent the message that they could take a Black life and that there would not be any real accountability under the law, which makes it dangerous for Black people and other people of color," Armstrong said Wednesday in an interview with NPR's Morning Edition.

Along with the charges against Kim Potter, a Brooklyn Center Police Department veteran who killed Daunte Wright, "that is a huge paradigm shift," if all of those officers "wind up being convicted," Armstrong said. "It would have been unimaginable just even a month ago that something like that was possible."

"There is a lot of excitement about the fact that what we would call a killer cop is finally convicted," she said.

Armstrong said "this did not happen because the system worked. This happened because the people put in the work. At every hand, we had to press for the officers to be fired, for them to be charged, for there to be more serious charges and things like that."

She's not sure that Chauvin's conviction will set a precedent for how police behave in the future.

"It remains to be seen as to how the system will respond when an officer shoots someone or has to make a split-second decision versus the circumstances of this case," Armstrong said.

In a separate Morning Edition interview, Chris Stewart, a lawyer for the Floyd family, said, "The system worked because the people put in work. And when something has a bright light shined upon it, it functions properly."

Bystander video of Floyd's murder on a Minneapolis street made all the difference in bringing attention to his death, Stewart said. "Normally I say justice by video is the only way that African Americans ever, you know, get prosecutions in this type of case. ..."

"If there were no videos, if there were no bystanders screaming, 'Get off him.' If no one was paying attention, we never would have heard of this case. ... The world wouldn't have made it go viral," Stewart said.

Stewart also represented the family of Walter Scott, a Black man whose fatal shooting in 2015 by a white police officer in North Charleston, S.C., also was captured on video. Stewart says the pandemic helped raise the focus on Floyd's death.

Coverage of Scott's death "was huge," Stewart recalls. "It was worldwide for about a month. And then people moved on. You know, you got back to work. You got back to your family. You got back to life. But when George Floyd happened, we were all trapped in our homes. You couldn't move on. You know, there was no going to work. There was no leaving the house. And so people that normally wouldn't care about the death of some Black man in Minnesota cared."

Stewart says that proper policing and caring about how police treat people of color are not mutually exclusive.

"Because you want to hold an officer accountable does not mean you're against policing ..." he said. "We've been pushed that you have to choose a side, which is pure stupidity. You know, you can support good policing and you can support victims that don't look like you."
Milton Guevara, Arezou Rezvani and Scott Saloway produced and edited the audio versions of this story. Avie Schneider produced for the Web.

With the verdict against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin now in for the murder of George Floyd, attention is turning to Congress and whether lawmakers can meet the growing demand from across the nation for meaningful changes to policing.

On Capitol Hill, the guilty verdict appeared to add a new sense of urgency around talks on the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House of Representatives in early March, but seven weeks later remains bogged down in the Senate.

The legislation would ban chokeholds and end qualified immunity for law enforcement - the legal protection for police officers that limits victims' ability to sue for misconduct. It would ban no-knock warrants in federal drug cases, mandate data collection on police encounters and create a nationwide police misconduct registry to help hold problematic officers accountable. The bill would also prohibit racial and religious profiling and redirect funding to community-based policing programs.

The bill passed the House by a 220-212 vote, mostly along party lines. But it has faced an uphill climb in the Senate, where Republicans have sought to revive a competing plan by Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., designed to diminish the use of chokeholds - but not ban them outright - and increase federal reporting requirements for use of force and no-knock warrants. Democrats blocked the plan last June, saying it did not go far enough to address racial inequality.

In the wake of the Chauvin trial, lawmakers from both parties are saying they want to see action on policing, but the path ahead seems far from certain. While Democrats technically hold the Senate majority, they would need 60 votes (all of the Democratic caucus plus 10 Republicans) to overcome a potential filibuster and pass legislation.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday after the verdict was announced, Rep. Karen Bass, who first introduced the House bill in the last Congress, said informal discussions were taking place between Democrats and Senate Republicans, but the California Democrat said she "would not call it negotiation."

Bass has said she would like to see a bill reach President Biden's desk by the one-year anniversary of Floyd's death on May 25, though it remains unclear whether Democrats will be able to secure the Republican votes they would need to reach that target.

"I am hopeful because I'm working with Sen. Scott, and Sen. Scott has received the blessing of his caucus," Bass said in an interview Wednesday with NPR's All Things Considered. "I believe that if he is supportive of the bill, that we will be able to round up the Republican senators that we need."

Scott, who has been leading talks for Republicans, expressed cautious optimism about reaching a deal on Wednesday, saying, "I think we are on the verge of wrapping this up in the next week or two."

One of the major sticking points has been qualified immunity, an issue that Scott, the only Black Republican in the Senate, said he was working to resolve with Bass; Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J.; and other Democrats.

"There is a way to put more of the onus or the burden on the department, or on the employer, than on the employee," Scott said. "I think that is a logical step forward and one that as I've spoken with Karen Bass over the last several weeks is something that the Democrats are quite receptive to."

He said other outstanding issues include how the legislation would deal with chokeholds and no-knock warrants.

Unlike last summer, when talks stalled in Congress, Democrats now hold the majority in the Senate and have a crucial ally in the White House. In a televised address to the nation after Tuesday's verdict, Biden said it was time for Congress to act.

"George Floyd was murdered almost a year ago," Biden said. "There's meaningful police reform legislation in his name ... legislation to tackle systemic misconduct in police departments, to restore trust between law enforcement and the people they're entrusted to serve and protect. But it shouldn't take a whole year to get this done."

Biden said he told the Floyd family that the White House would continue to fight for passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, but his administration has faced criticism for failing to detail his efforts to secure its passage.

Asked Wednesday about the president's role in the negotiations, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden plans to use his address to a joint session of Congress next week "as an opportunity to elevate this issue and talk about the importance of putting police reform measures in place." Psaki also said the administration has been in direct conversation with leaders in Congress as well as with civil rights leaders who are advocating for the bill.

"But I will also say that there are times, and this is true in diplomacy, but also true in legislating, that ... the best strategy is to provide the space for those conversations to happen privately, and that's part of our objective," she said.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Merrick Garland on Wednesday announced the opening of an investigation by the Justice Department into possible patterns of discrimination and use of excessive force by the Minneapolis Police Department - the first such "pattern or practice" investigation in the Biden administration.

The Black teenager who recorded the now-infamous video of Derek Chauvin pressing his knee on George Floyd's neck for nearly 10 minutes last May is being hailed as a hero following the former Minneapolis police officer's conviction on murder and manslaughter charges.

Darnella Frazier, who was 17 at the time, testified during the trial that she has spent nights apologizing to Floyd for "not doing more." Now, people across the country - including Floyd's family, President Biden and numerous celebrities and elected officials - are crediting her bravery and quick thinking in capturing the video that they say made the guilty verdict possible.

After the jury convicted Chauvin of all three charges, Frazier shared a post on social media expressing her relief and thanking God. "Justice has been served," she added.

Frazier had been taking her 9-year-old cousin to Cup Foods last Memorial Day when she saw police officers holding Floyd on the asphalt near the rear of a police vehicle, a scene she described during her testimony as that of "a man terrified, scared, begging for his life."

She sent her cousin inside the store and began filming. The 10-minute video she posted to Facebook has since been seen by millions and became a central piece of evidence in Chauvin's trial.

"When I look at George Floyd, I look at my dad, my brothers, my cousins, my uncles, because they are all Black," Frazier said from the witness stand. "I look at how that could have been one of them."

The graphic video captured a scene drastically at odds withthe initial police statement, which described the encounter as: "man dies after medical incident during police interaction." It said that Floyd physically resisted officers and made no mention of the prolonged restraint.

Many social media users and public figures are praising Frazier for taking the video, which they credit with disproving the police narrative and facilitating the trial's historic outcome.

Police officers are rarely convicted of murder for on-duty killings, and Chauvin is just the second such case in Minnesota's history.

In remarks delivered Tuesday, Biden alsonoted how rare such a verdict is and said Chauvin's conviction seems for many people to have been the result of "a unique and extraordinary convergence of factors" - including "a brave young woman with a smartphone camera."

Angela Harrelson, Floyd's aunt, lauded Frazier's bravery in a Wednesday interview with CNN.

"It really doesn't surprise me that much, with police cover-ups, because they've always had done that, especially towards Black and brown people," Harrelson said. "The sad thing is if it hadn't been for that 17-year-old girl Darnella, it would have been another Black man, that was killed by the police, his own fault, and they would have said, 'Oh, it was drugs, oh it was this.' And we would never have had the story we would have and wouldn't be here today talking."

Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Michael Moore wrote in a tweet that Frazier had changed the world, adding, "No film in our time has been more important than yours." Journalist Ann Marie Lipinski called it "one of the most important civil rights documents in a generation."

Some have called for Frazier to receive the Pulitzer Prize for photojournalism. Melvin Carter, the mayor of St. Paul, Minn., wrote, "What work of media has been more consequential in the past year?"

"She is a stellar example of how everyday people can be powerful in documenting injustice and creating momentum for accountability," tweeted Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va.

History should remember the incredibly 17 year old Darnella Frazier who had the strength and composure to capture the murder of #georgefloyd on video. Without her video there may never have been #justice.
- Valerie Jarrett (@ValerieJarrett) April 20, 2021

Frazier has received one award already - from PEN America, the nonprofit organization focused on freedom of expression. The legendary producer, director and screenwriter Spike Lee presented Frazier with an award for courage at a virtual ceremony in December.

"She documented the murder of George Floyd, our brother. King Floyd. And that footage reverberated around this God's earth, and people took to the streets all over this Earth," Lee said. "Not just the United States of America, and it wasn't just Black people either."

At the ceremony, a slew of high-profile figures - including actors Gabrielle Union and Meryl Streep, civil rights activists DeRay Mckesson and Anita Hill, and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J. - offered their praise and thanks in a series of brief video clips.

"I never would imagine out of my whole 17 years of living that this will be me," Frazier said as she accepted the award. "It's just a lot to take in, but I couldn't say 'thank you' enough for everything that's been coming towards me."

In the wake of the trial, supporters of Frazier are expressing their gratitude as well as their hopes that she will continue to receive support.

Frazier testified that she felt like she was in danger at the time and that police were threatening bystanders with Mace as they called for officers to stop hurting Floyd and render medical attention.

Many have noted that the experience and resulting trauma will stay with her permanently.

I haven't been able to stop thinking about the traumatized witnesses to Floyd's murder. Especially the young people. Darnella Frazier, the teen who filmed it. The store clerk who blames himself. I can't get them out of my mind. I hope the verdict brings them some peace.
- Lauren Williams (@laurenwilliams) April 20, 2021

Bernice King, CEO of the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, posted a tweet wishing "emotional healing" for Frazier, while journalist Evette Dionne offered prayers for the safety of Frazier and other bystanders who "now have a city police department's bullseye on their back."

Others are sharing the link to an online fundraiser titled "Peace and Healing for Darnella Fund," which was created last May and has raised more than $630,000 as of midday Wednesday.

"In addition to the trauma of watching a black man be murdered by police, she has had to deal with trolls, bullies and ignorant people harassing her online," organizers wrote. "It took unbelievable courage for her to stand there and bear witness to such an awful tragedy. We all have our roles to play in the revolution against white supremacy. Darnella played an important one and should be uplifted, not shamed."

In an update on Tuesday, organizer Mica Cole Kamenski said that while the fundraiser had originally been established to support Frazier's immediate healing and well-being, contributors wanted to provide the financial resources to ensure her long-term safety and that proceeds from the fundraiser will be transferred to a trust in Frazier's name.

Kamenski added that "because of Darnella Frazier, we saw a glimpse of accountability today."

"The support I had since day one carried me a long way," Frazier wrote on Facebook on Tuesday. "So thank you all again, thank you."

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Live Updates: Trial Over George Floyd's Killing

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The 2020 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, sparked nationwide protests and a reckoning about race and policing. A former Minneapolis police officer was convicted of murder in April.

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Edward Colston: Why are people arguing about statues? - CBBC Newsround

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Protesters in Bristol have removed the statue of a man named Edward Colston - but why do we have statues of people in the UK, and when should they be taken down?

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British protesters topple Edward Colston statue

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List of unarmed African Americans killed by law enforcement officers in the United States - Wikipedia

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DOC 6 : Police violence towards African Americans

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DOC 6 : Police violence towards African Americans

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A CNN reporter&comma; Omar Jimenez&comma; is arrested while covering the Minneapolis protest. Mr Jimenez was reporting live when police officers handcuffed him. A few minutes later several of his colleagues are also arrested. They are all later released once they are confirmed to be members of the media.

Derek Chauvin charged with murder

Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin&comma; 44&comma; is charged with murder and manslaughter. The charges carry a combined maximum 35-year sentence.

As the US saw another weekend of protests&comma; with tens of thousands marching in Washington DC&comma; anti-racism demonstrations were held around the world.

In Australia&comma; there were major protests in Sydney&comma; Melbourne and Brisbane that focused on the treatment of indigenous Australians. There were also demonstrations in France&comma; Germany&comma; Spain and the UK. In Bristol&comma; protesters tore down the statue of a 17th century slave trader and threw it into the harbour.

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George Floyd: How are African-Americans treated under the law?

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A CNN reporter, Omar Jimenez, is arrested while covering the Minneapolis protest. Mr Jimenez was reporting live when police officers handcuffed him. A few minutes later several of his colleagues are also arrested. They are all later released once they are confirmed to be members of the media.

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After all the attention the Black Lives Matter-led racial justice movement generated after George Floyd's death in 2020, new data show that the number of Black people killed by police has actually increased over the last two years.

According to data collected by The Washington Post, police shot and killed at least 1,055 people nationwide last year, the most since the newspaper began tracking fatal shootings by officers in 2015. That is more than the 1,021 shootings in 2020 and the 999 in 2019.

Black people, who account for 13 percent of the U.S. population, accounted for 27 percent of those fatally shot and killed by police in 2021, according to Mapping Police Violence, a nonprofit group that tracks police shootings. That means Black people are twice as likely as white people to be shot and killed by police officers.

"It's bad and it's sad, but it's not shocking that we're still being killed at a higher rate," said Karundi Williams, the CEO of re:power, a national organization that trains Black people to become political leaders. "When we have moments of racial injustice that is thrust in the national spotlight, there is an uptick of outrage, and people take to the streets. But then the media tends to move on to other things, and that consciousness decreases. But we never really got underneath the problem."

And the problems are many. Rashawn Ray, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a think tank, said it is a flawed notion that paying more attention to police brutality will result in less police brutality.

"People perceive that people protesting in the streets leads to people caring more, and sometimes it leads to people resisting the change more. And in this case, we're talking about officers resisting the change," said Ray, who is also a professor of sociology at the University of Maryland. "What we see in the immediate aftermath of the demonstrations is police officers' hunkering down and standing behind the blue wall of silence even more."

Williams said there is also an inherent foe that prevents widespread change.

"The system wasn't built to protect Black people," Williams said. "And until we get to the root cause of policing and police brutality and the differences in the way police treat Black folks versus white folks, we're not going to get to change."

Williams said the data mean that "until we get to policies that dismantle the system that exists, we're not going to see this stop."

"We can say, 'Things have changed because the national dialogue is changing.' But until we get to the crux of the problem, we're going to see this continue," she said.

Leslie Mac, an organizer and activist from Brooklyn, New York, who calls herself a "staunch abolitionist," said she was not surprised by The Post's numbers, saying they stem from a lack of movement on policies to change officers' attitudes.

"We've seen a double-down on reform measures that have already been proven to not work, that don't get to the heart of the white supremacy that is built into policing in this country," Mac said. "There's nothing that actually addresses the root issues that exist within policing, whether that's under-accountability, whether that's the amount of weaponry they have at their disposal or whether it's in who they're accountable to."

Carl Douglas, a Los Angeles civil rights lawyer, used his state as a barometer of the country's likelihood of achieving change around policing. "Even in California, which is supposed to be the bastion of liberalism, we were only able to pass a watered-down version of a police reform bill in the wake of George Floyd," he said.

"So, regrettably, I am not surprised by the numbers. I have been in this civil rights game 42 years. Change moves at the speed of an ocean liner and not a speedboat. I am optimistic, because I did see white people marching on behalf of Black civil rights, and that is progress. Those are incremental steps of progress. But they aren't stopping the problem."

Many people have called for more training for officers, but Douglas insisted that is more of an excuse than a solution.

"'They need training' is the narrative that makes white folks feel good because it excuses their biases," he said. "No, there has to be a cultural shift from the warrior-versus-them mentality to more of a guardian mentality."

The contrarian mentality exists, Douglas said, because many officers do not live in the cities or towns they patrol. In Minneapolis, where Floyd was killed, for example, only 8 percent of officers live in the city, according to an analysis by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Of the four officers tried in the 1992 case of Rodney King, who was struck as many as 56 times with batons, kicked and stomped, none of them lived in South Central Los Angeles, where the recorded beating took place.

"And because they don't live around us, they don't know us," Douglas contended. "Many drive to their all-white neighborhood, where the same racial tropes are perpetuated. The people they patrol don't look like their brothers or their fathers or their uncles or their cousins or their sons. They don't have a connection to the humanity of Black people, that sense of humanity that's needed to care about people ... on a human level."

Another study rebuts the notion that where officers live affects how they react when they encounter Black people. In addition, while Black people's trust of the police rose slightly in 2021, the level is just 27 percent, up from 19 percent in 2020, according to a Gallup poll.

Funding the police versus redirecting funding

For a period after Floyd's killing, lawmakers vowed to cut police funding in many cities. But many of those budgets were restored or increased by the end of 2021. That happened even as the national rate of police killings overall, but especially of Black Americans, increased, according to The Washington Post's data.

"They're turning these encounters into ghastly encounters," said Mac, the activist. "I don't know any other instance where an apparatus can be so bad at its job and continue to get increased funding. It really flies in the face of conventional wisdom. It's just putting bad money on top of bad money."

Beyond defunding the police, she said, redirecting resources should be the objective.

"I don't see a way out of this until we look beyond policing for safety for our communities," she said. "The very righteous call to defund the police is not just about taking resources away from the police. It's also about where we put those resources to get us beyond these moments of people being killed."

Like others who want to abolish police and systems of incarceration, Mac said funds intended for police should instead address root problems like ensuring safe housing and sufficient clothing, food and mental health and addiction services.

"The police are not equipped to deal with those things," she said. "And so really what these communities are screaming for is to have resources put in the places where the community actually needs them. And I think so much of that got lost in the 'How dare you take money away from the police to be safe.'"

'Trying to transform, reform and reimagine' policing in California

Mike Gipson views the issue from two perspectives: as a former police officer in Maywood, California, and now as a longtime state Assembly member. From both sides, Gipson said, he has been bothered.

"It was troubling back in 1992, when I wore a police uniform and we viewed a videotape of motorist Rodney King and the abuse this man went through," Gipson said. "It was a slap in our face, the Black community, when those officers were acquitted. I was horrified then and I'm horrified now when individuals' lives are taken at the hands of police. It doesn't have to happen at the rate it is."

Now ,as a policymaker, Gipson is "trying to transform, reform and re-imagine" policing in California, including "holding bad police officers accountable and putting policies in place that remove them from the profession I once loved," he said.

Mac said the origins of policing are from the era of slavery, when "slave patrols" monitored enslaved Black people, deploying tactics similar to those that some officers use today.

For example, Mac compared the slave patrol's ability to confront formally enslaved Black people to the stop-and-frisk policies still used in many states.

"Those slave patrols were able to inflict impromptu punishments," she said, "where they were allowed to be judge, jury and executioner on the spot. And that has never changed. And so, of course, this has always been about controlling Black bodies, controlling Black people, to protect white supremacy and white wealth. That's the scenario that police find themselves in today."

Ray, like many others, said he is deeply disturbed that the Senate did not vote on the proposed George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. "Super tragic," he said.

"A person gets killed by the police, on average, every eight hours. That's a normal thing. So police violence is an endemic, and when things are an endemic, it's kind of like Covid. People got used to it: 'Man, whatever. I'm just going out.' That's how police violence is right now. We've been dealing with it ever since slave patrols."

Re-evaluating the policies that shield officers

Many officer-involved cases are settled before they make it to court, which does not help the overall mission of stopping the violence against Black people, civil rights lawyer Daryl K. Washington of Dallas said. Taking the cases to trial, Washington said, would expose corruption and force "these police departments to have to change their hiring practices."

He added that the protection that police unions provide helps to embolden officers, as does qualified immunity, which, in part, protects officers from being held personally liable for using deadly force. The legal doctrine that Washington considers far more dangerous, however, is called "clearly established law," which, in essence, says "that even though I can show the judge that what this officer did was wrong and excessive, I have to be able to show that there was another basically identical case to his case that would have put the officer on notice that what he did or what she did would not be constitutional. If there isn't a very similar case, there's no accountability and the case doesn't go to trial. And that makes no sense."

Gipson introduced bills that California Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed into law, including the elimination of chokeholds by police and the holding of knees on suspects' necks, which is how Floyd was killed in May 2020.

Now he is focused on a bill that would require law enforcement officers to secure insurance to offset taxpayers who end up footing the bill for multimillion-dollar settlements when officers harms r kill people.

"Lawyers have to have malpractice insurance. Doctors have to have malpractice insurance. Why shouldn't officers have malpractice insurance?" Gipson said.

James Samuel Jr., a former Air Force engineer who spent two decades working in U.S. intelligence communities, was unsettled by officer-involved shootings before Floyd's murder was captured on video. Floyd's death accelerated his plan to create his app, called Anjel Tech, which was designed to capture encounters with law enforcement officers in real time.

With the app, users preload emergency contacts to be pinged when they are pulled over or confronted by law enforcement officers. The app records video and audio of the encounters and livestreams them to users' contacts. It also has a GPS element that shows and gives directions to contacts about where confrontations are taking place.

"This is a whole new level of accountability in that moment, because it's recording not just what's happening, but your people will see and hear it and know where it's happening and can come to your aid," Samuel said. "The hope is that officers will be held accountable through the app so much that they will change their behavior. Something has to help change this terrible trend."

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Report: Black people are still killed by police at a higher rate than other groups

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After all the attention the Black Lives Matter-led racial justice movement generated after George Floyd's death in 2020, new data show that the number of Black

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DOC 3 : I have a dream by Martin Luther King

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DOC 3 : I have a dream by Martin Luther King

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When the statue of a UK slaver was pulled down, it had special resonance for one man thousands of miles away.