To sum up, on May 25, George Floyd was arrested in Minneapolis by four police officers. While being restrained, one of the officers pressed Floyd's neck with his knee, despite Floyd already being handcuffed, offering no visible resistance and complaining about the pain. In fact, police officer insisted on not relieving Floyd, even after the latter lost his consciousness. Floyd eventually died and the official
autopsy indicated that his death was partly the result of the violent restraint, among other factors. His arrest, however, was recorded by bystanders and the video footage depicting the unnecessarily harsh conditions of Floyd's arrest sparked rather unsurprisingly a huge controversy.
Riots erupted in several American cities, where several instances of arson, looting, vandalism and even
fatal shootings were reported. The four implicated officers were fired, while Derek Chauvin, the one having his knee on Floyd's neck, was arrested and charged for murder and manslaughter. Regarding political reactions, the incident has been condemned by a few current or former state leaders, some of them with a bit of a
shady history on the issue of state oppression, but most of the attention was focused on Donald Trump's promise to decisively restore order, which was then
marked by Twitter as an incitement to violence.
In my opinion, the affair is more the result of the incompetence, under-funding and lack of training or transparency of the police force than a symptom of racism, although the second possibility cannot be excluded, until more information becomes available. Bullies like Chauvin have no place in any position of authority and it's utterly embarrassing for the Minneapolis department to be so incapable of adequately verifying of whether its members fulfill the most elementary criteria or not. On the other hand, I remain optimist that the situation will slowly, but gradually improve, as the society becomes more sensitive to these issues. Riots are unacceptable and, even from a cynical perspective, probably damaging to the cause, at least in the short term, but massive protests, together with advances in technology, certainly contribute to prevent several similar cases of arbitrary violence from occurring in the future. For example, it's good to see that Chauvin has already been ousted and
arrested,
Daniel Pantaleo, a New York police officer also blamed for the death of an arrested suspect under almost identical circumstances, was fired only five years after the event.