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Just for the Record
The expert witnesses in the George Floyd trial have added their opinions to the court record. The prosecutor’s witnesses say Chauvin killed Floyd. The defense witnesses say Floyd’s underlying cardiac disease killed him (along with a little carbon monoxide and presumed effects of a paraganglioma–finding a paraganglioma on autopsy does not confirm that the paraganglioma was metabolically active; such can exist without causing any clinical symptoms whatsoever–that was discovered during his autopsy). The medical examiner had already ruled the death a murder. All of this is meretricious film flam.
There is no possibility at all, physically, that Chauvin’s actions could have killed Floyd. Physically impossible. A presumed cardiac arrhythmia is just that: Presumed. No way to confirm or refute that claim, except that clinically, Floyd’s death did not follow a pattern that would have indicated such an arrhythmia, e.g, an abrupt demise. His was a gradual (over some minutes) decline. There was no evidence of an acute myocardial infarction on autopsy that would have underpinned that claim from the defense expert.
The only thing that could possibly have happened, is that Floyd died of a drug overdose. His gradual decline, after proclaiming that he “ate too many drugs,” is fully consistent with the respiratory depression caused by Fentanyl. This was a drug overdose death. No one will say that, apparently for political reasons. The levels of fentanyl ascertained on autopsy were sufficient to cause death. The clinical course was fully consistent with a drug-induced overdose death.
The fault of the officers is that they did not recognize the situation in a timely manner and get the right help: e.g., an IV dose of Narcan, and possibly respiratory support (intubation). They did not start CPR. One can fault them for that, but those skills are the bailiwick of a good ER physician, not cops on the beat. And, unfortunately, the great and learned experts missed exactly what the cops missed.
A farce.
To cite the most relevant savant on such events: Stupid is as stupid does.
That’s all I’m going to say about that.
Published in General
Much of what is claimed in this case is a little mystifying to me. I read the autopsy report months ago. IIRC the conclusion was that Floyd’s death was due to Rx overdose. The known history of his ingesting drugs, and the pattern of his decline, fit that conclusion. I think I saved that report somewhere. Looking for it now.
I think it was Heinlein who said that sometimes stupidity is a capital crime.
Count me in.
Floyd was a big, strong guy. The idea that two cops kneeling on him like that…with the knee on the back and side of the neck and not on the throat…could kill him is ridiculous on its face. And he complained of breathing difficulty before they restrained him, on video (which I never saw the defense mention but maybe I missed it…total inexplicable malpractice if it wasn’t mentioned).
The strange thing is that he died while they were restraining him. Is that just a coincidence? Really bad luck for the cops? If I understand the prosecution case, they are saying that the cops’ actions alone killed him and that it was foreseeable that they would. If they had argued that the cops should have recognized a fatal drug overdose and didn’t respond correctly, that would be believable, but I don’t think that was the gist of their case.
Not necessarily. He could have had an arrhythmia like A fib with RVR, or V Tach, which could indeed kill him over the space of minutes. In those cases you can see a gradual deterioration of cardio pulmonary function over many minutes.
Both of which could be caused by a combination of his underlying cardiac disease and a drug overdose.
Well, you can give narcan after they have a cardiac arrest, but unless you can correct the cardiac problem ( is it V Fib, in which case you need to try and shock the person, or is it asystole, in which case you need to give epinephrine in an attempt to restart cardiac activity, a worse prognosis). The narcan will eventually stop the respiratory depression which is the main reason opiate OD kills people.
Actually I agree with you. A conviction of manslaughter based on culpable negligence would not be unreasonable. But only if the cause of death were acknowledged. Not acknowledging the cause of death puts jurors in an impossible position. They will be thoroughly confused and any decision they make (except a hung jury) would be an unjust decision. I think there is a difference between doing something (restraint in such a fashion as to directly and intentionally cause harm though not necessarily intending to kill) and failing to do something(recognize the possibility of an overdose and take action to treat it in a timely fashion) that would weigh on jurors minds and affect their deliberations. The prosecution alleges malicious intent; the defense claims an unforeseen event(arrhythmia) that is a natural cause of death thar Chauvin could not foresee and had no obligation to recognize or means to intervene. Both are wrong and preclude the possibility of a just outcome in my view.
Actually, CPR is now taught and promoted by the American Heart Association as “Compression Only CPR”.
The reason is that they found A. People were reluctant to do CPR , and B. the research showed that by interrupting CPR for breaths, the coronary artery filling pressure would drop to zero for a fairly long period, not doing the breaths, and just continuing with good compressions, particularly by inexperienced persons avoided this.
“Analysis of human data from a national out-of-hospital CPR registry documented no survival advantage to ventilations plus compressions compared with the provision of chest compressions alone during bystander resuscitation (LOE 4*).”
The medical examiner was asked at trial whether he still believed homicide was the appropriate finding and said yes. This is obviously in the FWIW category, since I’m sure he feels some pressure as well, but that’s the on the record testimony.
What would the police have actually done or been able to do to save Floyd once he stopped breathing?
Did the police have narcan?
What good would any chest compressions have done? It would not have circulated oxygenated blood.
Would the compressions have distributed the narcan, if they had had it? And if they had had narcan, would they have been able to get a vein? What good would compressions have done if the narcan were given into the muscle rather than IV?
Did the police have an ambu bag? Did they have a CPR mask? Even with a CPR mask, the air from Floyd’s covid-infected mouth and lungs would have been released right in the faces of the police; masks are not designed to prevent airborne or droplet transmission, but only to act as a contact barrier. Would artificial respiration have been a required risk for the police?
What could the police have done that would have saved Floyd from an overdose?
Added: And from what I have read, mouth-to-mouth is even proscribed now from CPR.
AND. This assumes that police will have the expertise to recognize wildly different symptoms of opioid overdoses. Instead of coming upon an individual who has lost/is losing consciousness, as we assume a heroin overdose looks, you see a wildly animated individual. Is that some very different drug or a mental condition or . . . . What happens under those conditions if you jab a person with a drug designed to counter opioid overdoses?
In general, narcan is pretty harmless in someone not using opiates. Exceptions are , if someone is addicted and you give then narcan you can precipitate acute withdrawal, and in rare cases narcan can cause acute pulmonary edema .
The issue I have with this concept is that it is finding the officers guilty of causing a death by inaction when their job isn’t to save a person’s life. EMTs arriving on the scene of a person in distress could also be held liable for manslaughter if they took normal, by the book, actions and the patient died by this logic.
One would have to have had an ekg or rhythm tracing to make that assertion. Given absence of any such evidence the claim that the cause of death was an arrhythmia is pure speculation. One can of course claim an arrhythmia ocuured, eg, asystole, as Mr Floyd did expire.To assert that as the cause of death is preposterously circular.
The agitation can be explained by the methamphetamine present. The demise would be the result of the fentanyl. Complicated situation that would be difficult for anyone to understand on the spot without toxicology information or a clear history and timeline of drug ingestion.
All appropriate questions that a jury might consider if they were presented with the actual cause of death and asked to determine under the circumstances if the officers should be accountable for their inaction (were I a juror I believe I would say “no”). Under the circumstances the jury will consider none of these questions unless they figure out on their own what the actual cause of death is. They will have received incorrect information from both prosecution and defense experts in what can only be considered a fraud, a hoax, or a massive attempt on both sides to subvert justice.
What bothers me about Andrew McCarthy is that he treats this trial as if it were fully legitimate; in my view, this trial as charged and prosecuted is devoid of legitimacy. Unless one believes that Stalinist show trials were legitimate. The cause of death has been totally obfuscated and hence justice is impossible. McCarthy, with a blindness that I attribute to his prosecutorial career, seems incapable of recognizing that.
Then I plead guilty to the same charge. I’ve made the best case that I could, above, for why charging Chauvin with something is not inappropriate, so no need to revisit that. To the extent Ellison has turned this into a social justice “show trial,” I think we can all agree that it’s a shameful approach. But it does not completely exonerate Chauvin. I’d also refer you to Scott Johnson over at the Powerline blog, a conservative who is a Minnesota resident and who has followed the trial extensively from the beginning. To my knowledge, he’s never been a prosecutor, but posted today that he believes that second degree manslaughter is an appropriate charge. I’m not displeased to be in his company.
Is McCarthy a lawyer? Lawyers tend to do that.
I find it perplexing that Derek Chauvin is being charged with murder for trying to arrest a guy who was most likely in the midst of dying from a drug overdose, while the officer who deliberately shot Ashley Babbit in the head at point blank range for trespassing, isn’t being charged with anything, and authorities even refuse to acknowledge who he is. And yet in the Chauvin trial they were splitting hairs over what constitutes “appropriate use of force (think of Babbit).”
My point was his gradual deterioration could indeed be due to an arrhythmia. It was asserted it could not have been an arrhythmia because it was gradual. In fact you cannot use that to rule out an arrhythmia.
She’s a dead white veteran. That should clear up your confusion.
I am 65 years old in moderate good health and about the size of George Floyd. I feel confident that I would survive with no problem if the George Floyd arrest was re-enacted with me in the George Floyd part. Without the fentanyl overdose, it was just another day for on the street with a life time criminal resisting arrest.
Yes. Homicide. Murder.
I agree with this, but what was Chauvin capable of doing that he failed to do? And also, what delay of dealing with the condition did he cause?
All murders are homicides but not all homicides are murders.
The Australian witness testified that he thought any healthy person would have died under the same exact police handling encountered by Floyd.
I’m 62 and I am supremely confident that I would not have died in that situation, either, even if it lasted an hour. All day long for that matter. I think the idea of charging Officer Chauvin is a joke.
excellent post
Yes, but if there was a call to do CPR, the P would not have been safe for the policemen.