Bodycam footage from two of the accused cops in the murder of George Floyd was revealed by DailyMail.com today — and it shows a rookie officer terrifying Floyd by pointing a handgun at his head and another callously picking a pebble from the squad car tire just inches from the dying man and seconds before he takes his last breath.
The tapes show in minute detail how a very distressed Floyd begs ‘Mr. Officer, please don’t shoot me. Please man,’ before the struggle that ended fatally on May 25.
It also shows how belligerent cops cursed at and manhandled the sobbing suspect, ignoring his pleas for sympathy.
Floyd resisted as the cops tried to force him into the back of the police car, telling them he suffers from claustrophobia and anxiety and how Officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes, leading to his death, ignoring Floyd’s repeated cries.
Floyd is even heard foreseeing his own death. ‘I’ll probably just die this way,’ he said.
Transcripts from the videos were released in mid-July but a judge in Minneapolis had ruled the video could only be viewed in the courthouse, meaning few people have had the chance to watch the powerful images.
But the footage has now been leaked to DailyMail.com so the world can finally see the tragedy of Floyd’s last minutes as the cops were ignorant of Floyd’s pain and agony.
The footage includes more than 18 minutes from Officer Alex Kueng’s bodycam and 10 minutes from Officer Thomas Lane. They were the first two cops to arrive on the scene after a complaint that Floyd had attempted to pass a fake $20 bill to buy cigarettes at Cup Foods, a store in the Powderhorn Park section of Minneapolis.
Chauvin and a fourth officer, Tou Thao, were called in to assist. All four were fired the day after Floyd’s death after pressures from the nation.
Chauvin, 44, has been charged with Floyd’s murder while the other three face charges of aiding and abetting murder. The events have led to months of Black Lives Matter protests throughout the country over police racism and brutality.
The two officers’ bodycam videos have been filed with Hennepin County District Court by Lane’s defense attorney.
It is clear from the video that Floyd was not trying to run away – he had plenty of time to escape the scene before the police officers arrived. But instead, he decided to sit in his car with two friends, giving the cops the opportunity to come forward.
The videos begin with Lane, 37, and Kueng, 26 — both in their first week as Minneapolis police officers — entering Cup Foods. A staff member rushes up to them waving the banknote. ‘Before they drive off. He’s parked right here. It’s a fake bill from the gentleman,’ he tells the cops.
Lane and Kueng then moved towards Floyd’s blue Mercedes SUV on the other side of the street. Lane goes to the driver’s side where Floyd is sitting at the wheel and Kueng approaches the passenger side, where Floyd’s ex, Shawanda Hill is in the back seat and a friend, Maurice Hall, is in the front.
Lane is seen knocking on the car window with his flashlight, but Floyd does not immediately open the door. Once the door is open, Lane immediately pulls out his handgun and points it straight at Floyd’s head.
‘Hey man, I’m sorry,’ Floyd says and apologizes again before Lane gets aggressive.
‘Put your f***ing hands up right now! Let me see your other hand,’ the cop is heard saying.
Floyd does not immediately put his hands on the wheel. ‘Put your f***ing hand up there,’ Lane orders him. ‘Jesus Christ, keep your f**king hands on the wheel.’
Floyd tells the officer he had been shot before, and Lane replies: ‘Keep your f***ing hands on the wheel.’
Lane then tells Floyd to put his foot inside the vehicle. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ Floyd added. ‘God dang man. Man, I got shot the same way, Mr. Officer, before.’
‘Okay. Well, when I say ”Let me see your hands,” you put your f***ing hands up,’ Lane responds.
The cop then orders Floyd out of the car. ‘Hands on top of your head. Step out of the vehicle and step away from me,’ he says.
Floyd replies: ‘Okay. Mr. Officer, please don’t shoot me. Please man.’
‘I’m not going to shoot you,’ Lane says. ‘Step out and face away.
‘I’ll look at you eye-to-eye. Please don’t shoot me man,’ Floyd replies. ‘I just lost my mom, man.’
Floyd, 46, is seen sobbing as Kueng and Lane pull him out of the car and handcuff him.
After getting Floyd out of the car, Lane then starts talking to the passengers. ‘Why’s he being all squirrelly and not showing us his hands and just being all weird like that?’ Lane asks.
‘Because he’s been shot before,’ Hill, 45, replies.
‘Well I get that,’ Lane says. ‘But still, when officers say: ”Get out of the car…”
‘Is he drunk or something?’
‘No, he’s got a thing going on,’ Hill says, pointing to her head and making a circular movement with her finger as if to suggest her ex had mental problems. ‘About the police,’ she adds.
The two officers then walk Floyd to the squad car and the struggle gets more intense when Floyd refuses to get in, saying he is claustrophobic.
He falls to the ground. ‘Stand up. Stop falling down,’ Kueng shouts. ‘Stay on your feet and face the car door.’
‘Please man. Don’t leave me by myself man, please. I’m just claustrophobic.’
‘Well you’re still going in the car,’ Lane says.
‘Y’all, I am going to die in here,’ Floyd protests. ‘I’m going to die, man. I just had COVID, man. I don’t want to go back to that.’
Lane offers to roll the cruiser’s windows down to help his phobia but Floyd still struggles. ‘I’m scared as f***,’ he says.
A bystander tells Floyd to calm down because he cannot win with them. ‘I don’t want to win,’ Floyd says. ‘I’m claustrophobic and I’ve got anxiety. I don’t want to do nothing to them.’
While still in the car, Floyd says for the first time the line that has become synonymous with his death. ‘I can’t breathe.’ Shortly afterward Chauvin and Thao show up.
The officers finally get him in the squad car and close the rear driver’s side door behind him, but for a reason that is not clear from the video, Floyd comes out of the passenger side door still struggling.
Shortly after he is lying on the sidewalk with Chauvin’s knee pressed on his neck and Lane and Kueng helping to restrain him.
He says he can’t breathe over and over again and calls for his ‘momma’ but his voice slowly gets weaker as his life drains away.
‘Tell my kids I love them. I’m dead,’ he says at one point.
Kueng is seen calmly picking a pebble from the squad car tire with his right hand as he restrains Floyd’s legs with his left one.
As his knee presses the life out of Floyd, Chauvin, the most senior officer on the scene, asks rookies Lane and Kueng if they are okay. ‘My knee might be a little scratched but I will survive,’ Lane answers.
Thao asks his fellow officers whether Floyd is high.
‘I believe so. We found a pipe,’ Kueng replies. Lane says: ‘We found a weed pipe. There might be something else, there might be like PCP or something.’
When Floyd continues to wail that he can’t breathe, Kueng is heard telling him. ‘You’re fine. You’re talking fine.’
Floyd replies: ‘I’ll probably just die this way.’
‘I’m through,’ Floyd says. ‘I’m claustrophobic. My stomach hurts. My neck hurts. Everything hurts. I need some water or something, please.’
‘Then stop talking. Stop yelling,’ Chauvin replies. ‘It takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk.’
As Floyd stops moving Chauvin keeps his knee on his neck, despite complaints from a small crowd that has gathered.
‘Check his pulse,’ one man says repeatedly. ‘You call what you are doing okay?
But the other officers do little to stop Chauvin. At one point Lane asks: ‘Should we roll him on his side?’ But Chauvin replies. ‘No, he’s staying where we’ve got him.’
‘Okay,’ Lane says. ‘I just worry about the excited delirium or whatever.’
‘Well, that’s why we got the ambulance coming,’ Chauvin says.
By the time EMTs arrive, George Floyd is dead.
