The EMT who leads the Minneapolis Police Department’s emergency medical response training told jurors in the murder trial of Derek Chauvin that officers are trained to call for an ambulance and provide medical aid if a situation is “critical.”
“If you don’t have a pulse on a person, you immediately start CPR,” officer Nicole Mackenzie said Tuesday. “If it’s a critical situation, you have to do both” CPR and call for an ambulance.
Chauvin is facing murder and manslaughter charges. Floyd, a Black man, died in police custody on May 25, 2020, after Chauvin, who is white, pinned his knee against Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes.
George Floyd’s brother Rodney spoke to reporters Tuesday afternoon and said the court proceedings have been “nail-biting.”
“It’s like watching a movie. There’s so many ideas of what’s gonna happen,” he said, mopping some sweat that gathered from his brow.
Rodney Floyd said the last time he was inside the courtroom was on the day when prosecutors played uninterrupted body-worn camera footage from different officers, showing his brother’s death over and over again.
Floyd said hearing his brother’s voice on the recordings was “very painful.” Floyd said his brother’s dying words from the videos were supplanting his memory of the last conversation they had, in which they reminisced about their late mother.
“When someone dies you cherish their last words, but my brother’s last words, oh, those words are stuck in my head. Agonizing,” he said. “The only thing that makes sense to me is him calling for mother. … The last conversation we had, he said mom was heavy on his mind. He’s a momma’s baby.”
