Man Says Derek Chauvin Jumped on His Neck Years Before George Floyd’s Death
DARK PAST
Derek Chauvin is notorious around the nation as the disgraced former police officer who pressed his knee against George Floyd’s neck for several minutes before his death on a Minneapolis street. Now multiple other people who had run-ins with the officer, years before his deadly encounter with Floyd, have accused him of using excessive force. One of them, LaSean Braddock, 48, told NBC News he was stopped without explanation by Chauvin and another officer in 2013. Despite his cooperation, he claims the officers became violent and attempted to drag him out of his car. “They tried to slam me on the ground, but I was about 240 pounds,” he said. “Then they jumped on my head and my neck and my back.” Braddock said he asked Chauvin why he had stopped him but wasn’t given an answer. Charges of failure to comply with police orders were later dismissed. “It’s unfortunate that they didn’t do anything to Derek Chauvin,” Braddock said, when reflecting on how Floyd might still be alive if action had been taken. “If they had done something about it, it might not have went that far.” A formal complaint Braddock filed against Chauvin in 2013 was dismissed.
The NBC News report included another man and a woman who said they had similar violent run-ins with Chauvin. Last June, The Daily Beast reported another Minneapolis man said the disgraced police officer shot and “tried to kill him” while responding to a 2008 domestic-violence call.