Thomas Lane, cop charged in George Floyd's killing, freed after securing $750k bail via crowdfunding
Thomas Lane, one out of the four Minneapolis police officers charged with the death of George Floyd, has been able to leave jail after posting a $750,000 bond. The four police officers involved in Floyd's brutal death were fired after a video of the incident went viral on social media. Floyd died after now-former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for a sickening 8 minutes and 46 seconds while restraining him. Three other officers involved — Tou Thao, Thomas Lane, and J Alexander Kueng — did not intervene to stop Chauvin, despite Floyd repeatedly saying that he was unable to breathe.
The three had assisted Chauvin in arresting Floyd on the suspicion that Floyd passed a counterfeit bill. They were charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and also aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter. It has now been revealed that Lane was released from the Hennepin County Jail where he was being held with the others, a spokesperson from the Sheriff's Office shared with The Star Tribune. Lane's attorney, Earl Gray, also confirmed that Lane had accepted bail with conditions and had also returned home to his wife. It is not known where the pair lives. Lane will be due to appear in court on June 29.
His attorney is hoping to file a motion that will dismiss all the charges made against him. He said, "Now we can watch what happens next from outside. We will bring a motion to dismiss and hopefully it will be granted." According to county jail records show, he was initially being held on a $1 million bail. Gray also shared that Lane had joined the police department as a cadet in February 2019. He had been on the job for only four days when the incident occurred.
While speaking to CNN, Gray said, he was "doing everything he thought he was supposed to do as a four-day police officer." We had earlier reported that Gray had spoken on Cuomo Prime Time where he suggested that Floyd also shared some blame for his death. Gray said that Floyd should have been more compliant when the officers attempted to get him out of his car.
According to Gray, Floyd "didn't show his hands" and "put his right hand down below the seat, which is clear evidence... that he might be going to grab a gun or hide drugs. They then took Mr. Floyd out of his vehicle because they were going to arrest him and he resisted leaving his vehicle, they finally got him out of his vehicle."
"It wasn’t a violent resistance but it wasn’t a kind of non-resistance that an individual should do when police officers are arresting him," Gray said. "He should get out of his vehicle and follow the orders of the police officers. He didn’t do that." Footage taken from inside a car behind Floyd's vehicle was published by a local news station KMSP. The clip shows one of the officers wrestling with him and trying to force him out. The other officer then walks over to the driver's side of the car to assist in ejecting Floyd from the vehicle and handcuffing him. Floyd can be heard pleading with the officers throughout the whole struggle.