‘I Thought He Was Dead’: Paramedics Who Treated Floyd Testify at Chauvin Trial

Paramedics who treated 👤George Floyd said he was not breathing and had no pulse when they arrived at the scene of his deadly arrest last May in testimony on Thursday at the murder trial of former policeman Derek Chauvin.

“In lay terms, I thought he was dead,” Derek Smith, one of the paramedics, told the jury. By the time Smith arrived, Chauvin, who is white, had been pressing his knee into the neck of Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man in handcuffs, for about nine minutes, a scene that ignited global protests against police brutality.

Chauvin, 45, has pleaded not guilty to murder and manslaughter charges. In a central dispute of the trial, his lawyers have argued that Floyd’s death, which the county medical examiner ruled was a homicide at the hands of police, was really an overdose caused by the fentanyl found in his blood at autopsy.

Prosecutors from the Minnesota attorney general’s office have told the jury they will hear evidence to contradict this, including testimony from his girlfriend about his drug tolerance, and that Floyd’s drug use is irrelevant to the charges against Chauvin.

Here are some key moments from the fourth day of witness testimony:

COURTENEY ROSS, FLOYD’S GIRLFRIEND

Courteney Ross, 45, was the first person who personally knew Floyd to testify in the trial, and with a heart-shaped brooch pinned to her black jacket she tearfully spoke of their romance and their shared struggles with opioid addiction.

“It’s one of my favorite stories to tell,” she said, smiling toward the jury, when asked by a prosecutor how she first met Floyd in August, 2017, at a Salvation Army homeless shelter, where he worked as a security guard.

She was waiting in the lobby to see the father of her son, tired after closing up the coffee shop where she worked. Floyd approached her.