Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of the 2020 murder of George Floyd, was stabbed and seriously injured in an Arizona prison Friday.
The Bureau of Prisons confirmed that an unidentified inmate at the Federal Correctional Institution, Tucson was assaulted at 12:30 p.m. PST and that “life-saving measures” were performed on him before he was transferred to a nearby hospital for further treatment.
Chauvin, 47, was identified as the attacked inmate by a source who spoke to the Associated Press on the condition of anonymity. He was transferred from a maximum-security Minnesota state prison in August 2022 to FCI Tucson, a medium-security facility with a spotty record on security lapses and staffing shortages.
Chauvin is concurrently serving a 21-year federal sentence for violating Floyd’s civil rights and a 22½-year state sentence for second-degree murder, after pressing his knee against Floyd’s neck for 9½ minutes outside a convenience store on May 25, 2020, where Floyd was being detained on suspicion of passing counterfeit currency. That set off nationwide protests against racism in policing.
The stabbing confirmed Chauvin’s lawyer’s fears that the disgraced officer might be a target for retribution. No suspects have been identified in the attack and no prison employees were injured. Inmate visits were suspended.
The attack comes only one week after the U.S. Supreme Court shot down Chauvin’s appeal of his murder conviction. He also has claimed to have new evidence that proves he didn’t cause Floyd’s death.
