2/15/2020 Tweets:
POLICE TRIAL: The defense will begin presenting its case Tuesday in the federal trial of 3 ex-officers charged in #GeorgeFloyd’s killing. Attorney Thomas Plunkett, who represents J Alexander Kueng, is up first.
Also yesterday: the prosecution rested its case following nearly 3 weeks of testimony. Darnella Frazier was the last witness called to the stand.
UPDATE: Despite the judge implying Plunkett was going to start first, it is actually defense atty Robert Paule (represents Tou Thao) who will be up first to present case.
First witness called up: FBI Special Agent Blake Hostetter, he is the case agent who investigate the case.
Hostetter interviewed Tou Thao along with a BCA agent, several days following the events of May 25, 2020.
Paule asking about Donald Williams, a bystander who said he trained with police at the academy. Hostetter said he's not aware of any of the 4 officers involved in training with him, and he believed Williams was talking about a gym.
Hostetter said the FBI didn’t record every interview at the beginning of the investigation. Says the FBI and BCA had separate investigations and different policies regarding recording.
Hostetter excused from the stand.
Tou Thao is now on the stand.
Defense atty Paule is asking about Thao's background. He was born in St. Paul and grew up in north Minneapolis. He identifies as Hmong. He has three young children, a 5-year-old, 2-year-old and 1-month-old.
Thao has 6 other siblings. He said he grew up poor.
Prosecution has objected during the background, citing relevance, but the judge overruled. Later asked for a sidebar, but was also denied that.
Tou Thao said his family moved to Fridley when he was 10, saying kids were joining gangs where they lived, so they wanted to get away from that.
Thao said he went from a diverse area to being the only minority in school.
Thao said he worked during high school to support his family, same with some of his siblings.
Thao went to Anoka-Ramsey Community College for one semester, but failed out because he didn't go to class.
Thao said he then started working at Cub Foods, the grocery store, and his family had to sell the house due to financial problems. They moved to an apartment.
Not long after he started thinking of becoming a police officer and working in the area he used to live in, north Mpls.
When asked what first made him want to become a police officer, Thao said he and his brother got into a fight, and his father beat him with an extension cord. The assault escalated to his father hurting Thao’s mother and getting a pistol out.
Thao said his father threatened to kill them. Thao assisted police in their arrest of his father. When his father was arrested, he said they were a couple of the most peaceful days of his childhood.
Thao said he then attended community college and actually tried this time. He also worked security in Maple Grove at Boston Scientific.
Thao then applied as a community service officer for the Mpls. Police Dept. But was not a sworn officer. He helped out at the department, and began training for the police academy.
He was in the community service program for a year and half. He was then hired on as recruit.
Thao then attended the police academy in north Minneapolis, with other training at Fort Snelling. Roughly six months of training in 2009.
Thao said he learned defensive tactics in police academy, like handcuffing, takedowns, Taser use, etc.
Defense showing pictures of takedowns during Thao's training, showing police restraining a man in a prone position. The picture shows one of the officer's knees on the person's upper back. #TouThao
Another picture shows #TouThao in uniform during training restraining a person in a prone position, knee on the back, with his hands holding the person's handcuffed hands on their back.
Defense's Paule now showing pictures of officers running/standing in formation.
Paule notes that it is similar to military formations. Tou Thao agrees.
Multiple pictures from training have now shown officers (including Thao) with knees on the upper back of people in the prone position.
Thao said the knee is used to prevent the person from moving around or getting up.
Tou Thao said it wasn't uncommon to use the knee on the upper back during training and he wasn't corrected when using it.
Thao said there were demonstrations on using neck restraints, but he never had hands-on training for that.
Following police academy training, Tou Thao was laid off due to budget cuts, so he went to work at Fairview Riverside Hospital in Minneapolis as a security guard.
Tou Thao now being asked about excited delirium. Thao said he was trained on it via powerpoint presentation during police academy and in-service training.
Atty Paule asks Tou Thao if he was asked to restrain people while at the hospital. Medical personnel would request the restraint. Tou Thao said he suspected, based on his training/experience, that some of the patients had excited delirium.
Tou Thao was then rehired by MPD in 2011. He needed some training to get back up to speed on policies.
Court takes a morning break.
While we are in a court break, here's a sketch of Tou Thao on stand. (credit: Cedric Hohnstadt)
Thao has been relatively calm on the stand, but briefly became emotional when speaking on abuse from his father. The incident first inspired him to become a police officer.
#TouThao was partnered with #DerekChauvin on middle watch duty on May 25, 2020. He worked at the 3rd Precinct.
He had been working for nearly half the shift before he was called to go to 38th and Chicago.
Thao said the area was "out of sector", meaning they didn't patrol that area, but no one else was available at the time. Responded to reported forgery, suspect still on scene.
They came to assist Kueng/Lane, since there seemed to be a struggle.
While on the way, Thao/Chauvin were canceled for the call. They continued on the way to the area, however, because the 38th/Chicago area is a hot spot for gang activity, including the Bloods.
Thao said they wanted to help just in case there was hostility.
Thao said as they pulled up to the scene, traveling down 38th westbound, they encountered Park Police Officer Chang.
Defense atty Paule shows body worn cam footage from Thao as he walked up to scene. Kueng/Lane were attempting to get #GeorgeFloyd inside the squad vehicle.
Tou Thao said in his 8 years on the force, he hadn't seen the level of resistance to get in the back of a squad car until that day.
Thao heard #GeorgeFloyd say he couldn't breathe multiple times. He said he never physically touched Floyd.
Thao said he assisted as a "puller" during the attempt to get Floyd into the back seat, meaning he was on the other side of the squad vehicle from the other officers and Floyd, assisting the officers. Not long after, Floyd was put into prone position.
Thao said it was obvious that Floyd was under the influence of drugs, and noticed beads of sweat on Floyd. Said the sweating was also a sign of excited delirium.
Thao said he remembers saying that officers are going to have to “hog tie” #GeorgeFloyd because he was out of control. He said he meant to say “hobble.” They are essentially the same thing.
Thao said if they used the hobble, a sergeant would need to respond and inspect the use of the hobble, which would have delayed EMS even more.
When asked about medical assessment of Floyd, Thao said he heard #GeorgeFloyd say that he "ate drugs." He said it's not uncommon for someone to eat drugs before police attempt an arrest.
Suspecting excited delirium due to the drugs, Thao said he wanted EMS to get there quickly. Plus, the crowd of bystanders was growing.
Thao said he suspected excited delirium because of Floyd's out-of-control actions and that 3 officers were struggling to control him.
Thao upgraded the EMS call to a more urgent "code 3" because he believed #GeorgeFloyd was undergoing excited delirium and EMS was needed to treat him and possibly save his life.
Thao said #DerekChauvin's use of knee on #GeorgeFloyd didn't seem unusual to him and he's seen it used before.
Thao said if he was one of the officers restraining Floyd, he'd be observing Floyd's medical condition. He said he assumed the other officers were taking care of him when he was doing crowd control.
Thao said he remembered the crowd saying "check his pulse."
Thao said he had "questions" about whether bystander Genevieve Hansen (who testified for prosecution) was actually an off-duty firefighter. He said they wouldn't normally come on to the scene like that, behind police officers. She also didn't show identification.
Thao said he didn't provide care to #GeorgeFloyd because he had a "different role" as crowd control. He assumed bystanders were telling officers restraining Floyd to check his pulse, not him.
Court is in a lunch break.
Court resumes with defense atty Paule questioning #TouThao, who is the first of the officers involved in the May 25, 2020 incident to testify.
Thao asked about when the ambulance arrived. He said he was still doing crowd control at that time, telling people to get off street.
Thao said he was there to “create a barrier” between the ambulance paramedics and bystanders. He said he wanted to prevent bystanders from disrupting or attacking medical workers.
Thao said he stopped crowd control when #DerekChauvin came up to him, tapped his shoulder and said “we’re done.” Thao said he didn’t know when the ambulance left because he was engaged in crowd control.
Thao said he had “no idea” there was something wrong with #GeorgeFloyd’s condition until later. He said he began connecting the dots when firefighters arrived after the ambulance left.
Shortly after firefighters arrived, #TouThao passed along word from dispatch for firefighters to relocate to where the ambulance was parked, blocks away from the scene.
https://twitter.com/WCCO/status/1493615561930162186
