*The Hennepin County Medical Examiner who conducted the autopsy on George Floyd listed his death as a homicide and determined that the cause was “cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint, and neck compression.”
But recent social media posts have falsely claimed that new court documents show Floyd died of a drug overdose, USA Today reports.
Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, died in Minneapolis in May 2020 after a white police officer, Derek Chauvin, pinned his knee against Floyd’s neck for nearly ten minutes. Floyd’s death sparked global racial justice demonstrations. Chauvin was ultimately convicted of second-degree murder.
During Chauvin’s 2021 trial, Hennepin County Medical Examiner Dr. Andrew Baker testified that Floyd’s heart disease and drug use were “contributing causes” but “not direct causes” of his death, per Politifact.
“I would still classify it as a homicide today,” he said.
Fowler is now speaking on #GeorgeFloyd‘s death certificate, explaining the immediate and underlying causes of death.
WATCH LIVE: https://t.co/t7Ar3u4Ntf pic.twitter.com/G1lDTTPFhf
— WCCO | CBS News Minnesota (@WCCO) April 14, 2021
Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson posted a video to his X account on Oct. 20 in which he says, “George Floyd, according to the official autopsy, was not murdered. He died instead of what we used to call natural causes, which in his case would include decades of drug use, as well as the fatal concentration of fentanyl that was in his system on his final day.”
The opposite is true as Floyd’s autopsy report hasn’t changed, the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s office confirmed on Nov. 3, according to factcheck.org.
Accordign to the autopsy report, Floyd had fentanyl in his system when he died, but Chauvin’s actions, which resulted in cardiac arrest, caused his death.
A recent Instagram video falsely claims that an August deposition in an unrelated case shows Floyd didn’t die from a homicide. According to USA Today, this court document from a former Hennepin County prosecutor does exist, but it doesn’t say Floyd “died from a drug overdose,” as the video claims.
Chauvin was convicted of murder and manslaughter and sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison. In a separate case, he pleaded guilty to violating Floyd’s civil rights and was sentenced to 21 years in federal prison. The two sentences are being served concurrently.
READ MORE: Biden Calls for Congress to ‘Pass Meaningful Police Reform’ on George Floyd’s 50th Birthday
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