Our live coverage of the nationwide George Floyd protests has moved here.
Prosecutors have now charged all four police officers involved in George Floyd’s death.
Derek Chauvin, the former officer who kept his knee on Floyd’s neck for almost nine minutes, had his charges expanded this week to include the more serious one of second-degree murder.
This was added to charges of third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
The other three officers – Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng, who helped restrain Floyd, and Tou Thao, who stood nearby – are charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter.
Let’s break down these charges:
What this means for prosecutors:
To prove third-degree murder, prosecutors have to show that Chauvin carried out “an act eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind,” without intent to kill, but without regard for life.
To prove second-degree murder, prosecutors have to prove the intention to kill or that the person caused a death while committing another felony crime.
In Buffalo, New York, two police officers have been suspended without pay after knocking down a 75-year-old man during the protests, Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said in a statement on Thursday night.
Brown said he was “deeply disturbed” by video of the incident, and that the police commissioner has directed an immediate investigation into the matter.
“After days of peaceful protests and several meetings between myself, police leadership and members of the community, tonight’s event is disheartening,” he said. “My thoughts are with the victim tonight.”
The video shows the man falling backward after being pushed and lying still with what appears to be blood on the ground below his head.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo also condemned the incident, saying he had spoken with Brown about it.
“This incident is wholly unjustified and utterly disgraceful. I’ve spoken with Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown and we agree that the officers involved should be immediately suspended pending a formal investigation. Police Officers must enforce — NOT ABUSE — the law,” Cuomo tweeted.
Wanda Cooper, Ahmaud Arbery’s mother, told CNN it was “heartbreaking” to hear that the men accused of killing her son had used a racial slur.
“It was very heartbreaking. I often imagine the last minutes of my son’s life. I didn’t imagine it would be that harsh, but to learn that that statement was made in the last seconds of his life – again, it was very heartbreaking,” Cooper said.
“I’m hoping that the death of my son, also of Mr. (George) Floyd, that their deaths will implement change,” Cooper said. “We need change. So no other African-American male will lose their life in such a manner.”
Some context: At a preliminary hearing earlier today, the judge ruled that all three defendants in the Arbery case – Travis McMichael; his father, Gregory McMichael; and William “Roddie” Bryan – would stand trial on all charges.
Bryan told investigators he heard McMichael use a racial epithet after fatally shooting Arbery.
Watch:
It’s just past 8:30 p.m. in Los Angeles, where protests are still continuing in full force.
There is no curfew in the city today, and demonstrations have stayed peaceful all day, without violent confrontations or clashes, according to CNN Correspondent Kyung Lah at the scene.
One group of protesters is now marching through a tunnel in downtown LA, Lah said.
Protesters chant slogans as they march, with music and drum beats blaring in the background. Cars are slowly moving through the tunnel along with marchers, with many drivers and passengers holding protest signs or raised fists out of their windows to show support.
“Last night we, saw some people arrested, but overall, most of the thousands who filled the streets of Los Angeles yesterday, did go home. There are fewer people on the streets today, but still … (there are) sizable crowds,” she said.
The leader of the Australian state of New South Wales is working with police to obtain a court injunction against a protest scheduled for Saturday in Sydney to support the Black Lives Matters movement.
NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said she was doing so “because the protesters could not guarantee adherence to the health orders.”
Under current rules, residents in the state can gather in groups of 10, and events with up to 500 people can take place as long as social distancing measures are taken.
Several protests in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement have been held or are being planned in Australia’s major cities.
The friend of George Floyd who was in the car with him when police first approached says Floyd gave officers no reason to fear him.
Hall said an officer reached into the vehicle to grab Floyd’s hands even as Floyd was trying to cooperate. “Once they reached for Mr. George Floyd’s hands, it took the whole situation into a turmoil that didn’t have to be,” said Hall.
Hall said he had known Floyd for years and that his friend was usually able to defuse tense situations.
“He gets ‘big guy’ status,” Hall said. “He gets extra attention, good or bad. But he knows how to conduct himself.”
Officers had separated Hall from Floyd while Floyd was being restrained with a knee on his neck. But Hall says he could hear Floyd pleading with officers that he couldn’t breathe.
Watch:
Protesters are still demonstrating in Washington, DC, even after a heavy downpour that swept through the downtown earlier today.
There is no curfew in the city tonight, reflecting the more peaceful nature of the protests these past few nights, according to CNN Correspondent Alex Marquardt on the scene.
Many of the protesters are now standing on the other side of a fence that had been put up earlier in the week following violent confrontations with law enforcement. On the other side of the fence, bright floodlights are being directed at the crowd.
“They have been lowered to eye height, so they’re pointing right into the faces of the protesters so you can’t see the forces behind the lights,” Marquardt said. “Those forces have become a huge point of contention.”
Some context: A huge influx of federal law enforcement has entered DC this week – members of the National Guard, FBI, ICE, TSA, and more – eliciting criticism from DC officials.
Police in New York have begun arresting protesters in Manhattan’s Midtown district, as crowds remain out on the streets in violation of the citywide 8 p.m. curfew.
After a day of mostly peaceful protests, the last remaining group of Manhattan demonstrators spent the past few hours marching north, starting from the lower end of Midtown up toward Central Park.
Then, as night fell and the protesters reached 57th Street, “officers just started moving in and making arrests,” said CNN Correspondent Shimon Prokupecz, reporting from the scene. “One of the officers was swinging his baton, and the captain actually pulled him back after seeing this officer doing this.”
Officers then began making arrests without any warning or announcement beforehand, Prokupecz said, estimating the police numbered in the hundreds.
“They came east, they came west, and they just swarmed this area. It was clear that they wanted to move in and take these demonstrators off the street,” Prokupecz said.
On the other side of the East River, protesters also faced off with police in Brooklyn – but here, they managed to defuse some of the tension in a moment of shared unity.
Tensions threatened briefly to boil over when protesters, numbering a little over a hundred, were met with a line of police officers. Then, one of the police chiefs reached out to speak with the protesters, shook some of their hands, and deescalated the situation, said CNN Correspondent Jason Carroll.
The case of Adama Traoré has striking parallels with that of George Floyd. Both were black men whose interactions with police led to their deaths. Both struggled to breathe in their final moments.
Their deaths have become rallying points in their countries for protests against police brutality.
Traoré died on his 24th birthday nearly four years ago in the suburbs of Paris, after he was taken into police custody for fleeing an identity check.
His sister, Assa Traoré, says police told her his final words were “I can’t breathe.”
“And that was the end for George Floyd. That was also the end for Adama Traoré.”
This week, thousands of people took to the streets of Paris to mourn George Floyd in solidarity – and to demand justice for Traoré, in defiance of a French ban on large public gatherings put in place to limit the spread of the coronavirus.
Read more:
Traveling pianist Davide Martello showed up in Minneapolis to spread a message of hope through music at George Floyd’s memorial.
Martello, also known as Klavierkunst, lives in Oklahoma City and drove 12 hours to the memorial to use his talent to help heal the community.
“I am from Germany and everybody is telling me how awful the pictures are and the medias are, so I just want to do something,” Martello told CNN. “Music is the perfect medium to restore peace, I think.”
The musician set up his piano in the middle of one of the streets where protesters were gathered and started playing. His melody quickly attracted an audience.
Those in the crowd told CNN the mood completely changed.
“We’re in the middle of a protest, in the middle of a riot, but you know, music can change people,” Terrance Jackson said.
Read more:
Gen. John Allen, the former commander of American forces in Afghanistan and former special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS under the Obama administration, added to his criticism of President Trump’s handling of the unrest and protests across the country.
Allen said Washington should “partner with governors and with mayors rather than upbraid them, to see how we can take this moment and rather than treat the American people as a potential enemy, treat the American people as a population with guaranteed rights under the Constitution who are in enormous pain right now, pain from the pandemic and pain from the realities of what was ultimately at the heart of the death of George Floyd.”
Some context: On Wednesday, Allen joined former Defense Secretary James Mattis and a chorus of other former military leaders in condemning the President.
He penned a blistering op-ed in Foreign Policy writing that change will “have to come from the bottom up. For at the White House, there is no one home.”
Allen told CNN the American people are looking for “leadership at the most senior level and this is a chance for the president to truly unite the country.”
“It’s a moment, an incredible moment for us in a context of we can take this as an opportunity to look at those factors that have brought hundreds of thousands of Americans into the streets to protest massive social injustice, centuries of racism and discrimination. Or we can make this a security problem and ultimately treat those individuals as a security problem themselves as they are seeking to exercise their first amendment rights, of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly,” Allen said.
Watch:
As the curfew in Atlanta went into effect at 9 p.m. ET, protesters engaged with police officers over their desire to remain on the streets.
The police officer at the scene responded, saying “that is not what we want.”
Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms addressed protesters earlier Thursday, but her message to organize and honor those who died at the hands of police was drowned out by hecklers.
CNN’s Nick Valencia reported that law enforcement began advancing and dispersing the crowd of demonstrators shortly after speaking with the protesters.
Watch scenes from the protest:
A video posted by the Atlanta Journal Constitution on YouTube shows Amber Jackson being body slammed by an officer who then handcuffs her during a protest near Lenox Square Mall in the Buckhead area of Atlanta on May 29.
Jackson suffered a broken clavicle as a result of the incident and is no longer able to work as a dental hygienist due to her injury, according to a press release from her attorney Mawuli Davis.
May 29 was the first night of protests in the Atlanta area in response to the death of George Floyd. Several businesses were damaged and looted in the area.
The video taken by the AJC shows a woman, identified by her attorney as Jackson, pulls away from an officer who then grabs her from behind and body slams her down to the ground.
CNN does not know what preceded the incident seen in the video.
The video moves before she hits the ground and a woman can be heard screaming in the background.
The video then cuts to Jackson being lifted by her arm by an officer while handcuffed.
Davis is holding a press conference Friday with Jackson, Georgia NAACP President James Woodall, as well as other activists and human rights leaders, the press release said.
Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms addressed protesters demonstrating for the seventh straight night in the city but her message to organize and honor those who died at the hands of police was drowned out by hecklers.
Bottoms said that the protesters “all matter to me” and that “there’s something better on the other side of this for us, and there’s something better on the other side of this for our children’s children.”
The mayor told demonstrators that the country is in the midst of a movement and people need to get together and articulate more than just their anger.
“I look forward to continuing to stand with you all,” she said.
Bottoms asked people to vote in next week’s local elections and stressed those who have been protesting get tested for Covid-19.
Faint boos and jeers could be heard from the crowd as she walked away.
Watch:
During an emotional caucus call on race today, Rep. John Lewis, an icon of the civil rights movement, said that while we may have “thought we were further… down the road to redeem the soul of America… we will get there.”
The lawmaker from Georgia’s 5th congressional district also shared that in all his years of leadership in the civil rights movement, he has yet to witness a movement like what he’s seen in the last few days.
House Democrats also heard from two prominent authors, Bryan Stevenson, author of “Just Mercy” and Robin DiAngelo, author of “White Fragility.”
Lewis reminded members to “be bold, be brave and keep your eyes on the prize.”
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is asking everyone who has protested the death of George Floyd to be checked for coronavirus.
“Anyone who demonstrated should receive a test for Covid-19,” Walz tweeted Thursday evening.
Walz included information in his tweet from the Minnesota Department of Health on how people in that state can arrange for a test.
“If you think you’ve been exposed, get a test five days after the event,” Walz wrote. “If that test turns up negative, get tested again 14 days after the event.”
Read Walz’s tweet:
It’s almost 8 p.m. in New York. In case you’re just joining us, here are the important headlines from today:
Rev. Michael Curry, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, said President Trump could have been an “example of moral and spiritual leadership” if he read from the bible he held up when he visited a church that had been damaged during demonstrations.
Trump received backlash Monday after he walked from the White House to St. John’s Episcopal Church, as peaceful protesters just outside the White House gates were forcefully dispersed.
Curry added that if Trump read the bible, he could have “invited the nation to a moment of silent prayer, asking everyone to pray for God to help with us, to find our way, to come together and to heal our land.”
Watch:
Lee Merritt, the attorney representing the family of Ahmaud Arbery, said he and the family are going to meet with the FBI and Justice Department tonight after new evidence was revealed in the case during Thursday’s preliminary hearing.
Waycross Judicial Circuit District Attorney George Barnhill was the second district attorney to recuse himself in this case.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation special agent Richard Dial revealed in his testimony during the preliminary hearing Thursday that Greg McMichael was in contact with his former employer, the Brunswick Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s office, while still at the scene of Arbery’s fatal shooting.
