George Clooney tells George Floyd’s family lawyer to ask Derek Chauvin to let someone kneel on his neck for 9 mins
George Floyd’s family lawyer has said that George Clooney is closely following the Derek Chauvin murder trial on the May 25, 2020, death. Attorney Benjamin Crump who is fighting the case on behalf of the African-American man’s family appeared on ‘The View’ virtually on Thursday, April 8, and told co-host Joy Behar that the 59-year-old actor time and again sends emails of advice to him on how to bring social change.
According to Crump, Clooney, who is the father of three-year-old twins Alexander and Ella whom he shares with his wife Amal Clooney, wants his kids to “live in a better world”. The lawyer also shared how the Oscar-winning star advised him to respond to the defense lawyer’s suggestion that Floyd’s cause of death was an overdose, not Chauvin’s use of excessive force on him.
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Chauvin allegedly knelt on Floyd’s neck for over nine minutes despite the latter saying, “I can’t breathe”. The former Minneapolis police officer is currently facing murder and manslaughter charges. On the fateful day last year, he along with three other officers had arrived at the scene after receiving a complaint of Floyd trying to use a fake note. The officer has pleaded not guilty claiming he did what he was trained to do.
Floyd’s family lawyer on Thursday gave details of the email he received from Clooney. "'Attorney Crump, you should tell them if Derek Chauvin feels so confident in that, he should volunteer during his case, to get down on the floor in that courtroom, and let somebody come and put their knee on his neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds and be able to see if he can survive,'" the email reportedly stated.
During his appearance on ‘The View’, Crump also said, “The experts will opine during this case that the average human being can go without oxygen from 30 seconds to 90 seconds -- where George Floyd went without oxygen for over 429 seconds, and that’s why it was intentional what this officer did. And I believe in my heart, Joy Behar, that he will be held criminally liable and it will hopefully set a new precedent in America.”
‘The Midnight Sky’ actor in the past had also spoken about the tragic death of Floyd. In June 2020, referring to the countrywide protests after the May 25 incident, he noted: “How many times have we seen people of color killed by police? Tamir Rice, Philando Castile, Laquan McDonald. There is little doubt that George Floyd was murdered. We watched as he took his last breath at the hands of four police officers. Now we see another defiant reaction to the systemic cruel treatment of a portion of our citizens like we saw in 1968, 1992, and 2014.”
Clooney added, “The anger and the frustration we see playing out once again in our streets is just a reminder of how little we've grown as a country from our original sin of slavery. The fact that we aren't actually buying and selling other human beings anymore is not a badge of honor. We need systemic change in our law enforcement and in our criminal justice system. ... This is our pandemic. It infects all of us, and in 400 years we've yet to find a vaccine.”
Clooney's representative confirmed to Entertainment Tonight that the actor sent an email to Crump.