George Perry Floyd Jr. (October 14, 1973 – May 25, 2020) was an African American man who was murdered by a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, during an arrest made after a store clerk suspected Floyd had used a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill, on May 25, 2020. One of four police officers who arrived on the scene, Derek Chauvin, knelt on Floyd's neck and back for almost ten minutes, fatally asphyxiating him. After his murder, a series of protests against police brutality, especially towards African Americans, quickly spread nationally and then globally. His dying words became a rallying slogan: "I can't breathe".
Floyd was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and grew up in Houston, Texas, playing football and basketball throughout high school and college. Between 1997 and 2005, he was convicted of eight crimes. He served four years in prison after accepting a plea bargain for a 2007 aggravated robbery in a home invasion. After he was paroled in 2013, he served as a mentor in his Christian community and posted anti-violence videos to social media. In 2014, he moved to the Minneapolis area, residing in the nearby suburb of St. Louis Park, and worked as a truck driver and bouncer. In 2020, he lost both jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
After his murder, the City of Minneapolis settled a wrongful death lawsuit with Floyd's family for $27 million. Chauvin was convicted on two counts of murder and one count of manslaughter on April 20, 2021, and on June 25, 2021, was sentenced to 22+1⁄2 years in prison. The other three officers at the scene were also later convicted of violating Floyd's civil rights.
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Early life and education
Floyd was born on October 14, 1973, in Fayetteville, North Carolina, to Larcenia "Cissy" Jones Floyd (1947–2018) and George Perry (1949–2002). He had four siblings.
After Floyd's parents separated when he was two, his mother moved with the children to Houston, Texas. The family settled in the Cuney Homes public-housing complex, known as the Bricks, in Houston's Third Ward, a historically African-American neighborhood. Floyd was called Perry as a child and also Big Floyd; being over six feet (183 cm) tall in middle school, he saw sports as a vehicle for improving his life.
Floyd attended Ryan Middle School and graduated from Yates High School in 1993. While at Yates, he was co-captain of the basketball team, playing as a power forward. He was also on the football team as a tight end, and in 1992, his team went to the Texas state championships.
Starting college before any of his siblings, Floyd attended South Florida Community College for two years on a football scholarship and also played on the basketball team. He transferred to Texas A&M University–Kingsville in 1995, where he also played basketball before dropping out. Floyd became a friend of future National Basketball Association (NBA) player Stephen Jackson, who was referred to as his twin because of their strong resemblance to each other, after being introduced in the mid-1990s. At his tallest, he was 6 feet 6 inches (198 cm) tall. By the time of his autopsy, he was 6 feet 4 inches (193 cm) tall and weighed 223 pounds (101 kg).
Adult life
Post-college
Floyd returned to Houston from college in Kingsville, Texas, in 1995 where he became an automotive customizer and played club basketball. Beginning in 1994, he performed as a rapper using the stage name Big Floyd in the hip-hop group Screwed Up Click. Following his murder, The New York Times described his deep-voiced rhymes as "purposeful," delivered in a slow-motion clip about "'choppin' blades' – driving cars with oversize rims – and his Third Ward pride." The second rap group he was involved in was Presidential Playas and he worked on their album Block Party released in 2000.
Between 1997 and 2005, Floyd served eight jail terms on various charges, including drug dealing, drug possession, theft, and trespass. In one of these cases, Floyd was convicted of possessing half a gram of crack cocaine in 2004 based on the testimony of police officer Gerald Goines. Later in 2019, Goines' involvement in the Harding Street raid led to Goines being investigated for a pattern of falsifying evidence. As a result, in April 2021, the district attorney of Harris County, Texas, requested a posthumous pardon for this particular conviction of Floyd's because of Goines' lack of credibility. In October 2021, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles recommended Floyd be posthumously pardoned for this conviction but withdrew the recommendation (and also withdrew 24 other clemency recommendations) in December 2021, citing "procedural errors and lack of compliance with board rules", while announcing that it would reconsider these recommendations.
In 2007, Floyd faced charges for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon; according to investigators, he entered an apartment by impersonating a water department worker and barged in with five other men, held a pistol to a woman's stomach, and searched for items to steal. Floyd fled the scene but was arrested three months later during a traffic stop, and victims of the robbery identified him from a photo array. In 2009, Floyd was sentenced to five years in prison as part of a plea deal and was paroled in January 2013.
After his release, Floyd became more involved with Resurrection Houston, a Christian church and ministry, where he mentored young men and posted anti-violence videos to social media. He delivered meals to senior citizens and volunteered with other projects, such as the Angel By Nature Foundation, a charity founded by rapper Trae tha Truth. Later, Floyd became involved with a ministry that brought men from the Third Ward to Minnesota in a church-work program with drug rehabilitation and job placement services. A friend of his acknowledged that Floyd "had made some mistakes that cost him some years of his life" and noted that he was turning his life around through religion.
Murder
On May 25, 2020, police were called by a Cup Foods grocery store employee, who suspected that Floyd had used a counterfeit $20 bill. Floyd was sitting in a car with two other passengers. Police officers forcibly removed him from the car and detained him. Police allege that Floyd struggled with the officers, with Floyd saying repeatedly on bodycam footage "that he could not breathe" even before being pinned to the ground.
Floyd was murdered by Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis police officer, who pressed his knee to Floyd's neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds while Floyd was handcuffed face down in the street. As seen in a witness's cellphone video, two other officers further restrained Floyd, and a fourth prevented onlookers from intervening as Floyd repeatedly stated that he could not breathe. During the final two minutes, Floyd was motionless and had no pulse, but Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd's neck and back even as emergency medical technicians arrived to treat Floyd.
The medical examiner found that Floyd's heart stopped while he was being restrained and that his death was a homicide caused by "cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint, and neck compression". The official examination also said underlying health conditions played a role in Mr Floyd's death and fentanyl intoxication and recent methamphetamine use may have increased the likelihood of death. A second autopsy, commissioned by Floyd's family, also found his death to be a homicide, specifically citing asphyxia due to neck and back compression; it ruled out the possibility that underlying medical problems contributed to Floyd's death and said that Floyd being able to speak while under Chauvin's knee did not mean he could breathe.
On March 12, 2021, the Minneapolis city council approved a settlement of $27 million to the Floyd family after a wrongful death lawsuit.
Chauvin was fired and charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. He was found guilty on all three murder and manslaughter charges on April 20, 2021. On May 12, Hennepin County district judge Peter Cahill allowed the prosecution to seek a greater prison sentence for Chauvin after finding that he treated Floyd "with particular cruelty". On June 25, Judge Cahill sentenced Chauvin to twenty-two and a half years in prison.
Legacy
Protests
After Floyd's murder, there were global protests and riots against the use of excessive force by police officers against black suspects and a lack of police accountability. Protests began in Minneapolis the day after Floyd's murder and developed in cities throughout all 50 U.S. states and internationally. The New York Times described the events in the wake of Floyd's murder and the video that circulated of it as "the largest protests in the United States since the Civil Rights era." Calls to defund and abolish the police were widespread. The protests became the first civil disorder event to exceed $1 billion in losses to the insurance industry. In some cities, protests were so violent that curfews were put in place.
Memorials
Several memorial services were held in honor of George Floyd. On June 4, 2020, a memorial service for Floyd took place in Minneapolis. Al Sharpton delivered the eulogy. Services were held in North Carolina with a public viewing and private service on June 6 and in Houston on June 8 and 9. Floyd was buried next to his mother in Pearland, Texas.
Colleges and universities that created scholarships in Floyd's name included North Central University, which hosted a memorial service for Floyd, Alabama State, Oakwood University, Missouri State University, Southeast Missouri State, Ohio University, Buffalo State College, and Copper Mountain College. Amid nationwide protests over Floyd's murder, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and his wife, Patty Quillin, made a $120 million donation to be split equally among Morehouse College, Spelman College, and the United Negro College Fund. The donation was the largest ever made to historically black colleges and universities.
In 2020, social-media-based artists and activists posted tributes to Floyd; one of the more popular tributes was a digital illustration created by Shirien Damra, which had more than 3.4 million likes on Instagram. Damra's work was later turned into painted murals in many communities and used in other ways. Other viral social-media-based tributes to Floyd were made by Nikkolas Smith, Stormy Nesbit, Dani Coke, Robin Hilkey, and Miriam Mosqueda.
Street artists globally created murals honoring Floyd. Depictions included Floyd as a ghost in Minneapolis, as an angel in Houston, and as a saint weeping blood in Naples. A mural on the International Wall in Belfast commissioned by Festival of the People (Féile an Phobail) and Visit West Belfast (Fáilte Feirste Thiar) featured a large portrait of Floyd above a tableau showing Chauvin kneeling on Floyd's neck while the three other officers turn their backs and each covers his eyes, ears, or mouth in the manner of the three wise monkeys ("See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil"). One Houston mural is on the side of Scott Food Mart in the Third Ward, while the other is on the property of The Breakfast Klub restaurant in Midtown. A childhood friend of Floyd's said that Floyd would never "have imagined that this is the tragic way people would know his name."
A GoFundMe account to support Floyd's funeral costs and benefit his family broke the site's record for number of individual donations.
Attempts for a posthumous pardon
In 2022, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles declined to issue a posthumous pardon for the 2004 drug raid that led to Floyd's criminal conviction.
Personal life
Floyd was the oldest of five siblings and had five children, including two daughters (aged 6 and 22 at the time of his murder) and an adult son. He also had two grandchildren.
In August 2017, Floyd met his girlfriend Courteney Ross in Minneapolis. In early 2020, the two separated.
Discography
Appears on (as Big Floyd):
DJ Screw – Ballin in da Mall (Screwed Up Records, Cassette, 1997), appears as feature on "Tired of Ballin (Freestyle)" by Tela
Diary of the Originator (Chapter 319 – Floyd & Screw) (Screwed Up Records, CD, 1998), appears on "Freestyle Sugar Hill"
Presidential Playas – Block Party the Album (Presidential Records, CD, 2000), appears on "Presidential Playas"
Diary of the Originator: Chapter 7 (Ballin in the Mall) (Screwed Up Records, CD, 2004), appears on "Freestyle"