BY PETER SESAY

Three years after the brutal killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, the wheels of justice keep turning. The city of Minneapolis where Floyd, a black man, was killed, agreed yesterday to pay nearly $9 million to two individuals who filed lawsuits against the city, saying the now-imprisoned white police officer pressed his neck on their necks too, before doing so to Floyd who died, prompting worldwide protests and marches in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic in the summer of 2020. The murder also prompted a civil rights investigation.

John Pope, Jr. one of the defendants, will received $7.5 million while the other defendant, Zoya, will receive $1.375 million. The Minneapolis City Council made the decision Thursday in a meeting about the matter.

You may also want to read: George Floyd mourned in a high-profile ceremony in Ghana

The two defendants filed the federal civil rights lawsuits against the city in May 2017, at which time John Pope, Jr., then aged 17, said Chauvin used excessive force on him when he responded to a domestic assault call. As for the second case, Zoya Code alleged that Chauvin used his signature tactic of pressing his knee on his victims’ neck, when he responded to a call after Zoya Code tried to use an extension cord to strangle her mother. Both Minnesotans are Black.

One could hear Pope, Jr. crying and saying repeatedly in a body camera footage released yesterday by the law firm that filed the case, “My neck really hurts,” while lying on his stomach, his hands cuffed behind his back and Chauvin’s knee on his neck. Chauvin’s colleagues could be seen walking out of the room in reaction to Pope’s crying.

Yesterday, Minneapolis City Mayor, Jacob Frey, apologized to all the victims of Chauvin’s brutality, saying that George Floyd would not have been murdered if police supervisors had done the right thing. Frey added: “He should have been fired in 2017. He should have been held accountable in 2017.”

The attorney for both Pope, Jr. and Code concurred. In a written statement made available to the press, the Bennett law firm blamed Chauvin’s fellow officers at the scene for not only failing to stop Chauvin, but also for their silence. “They violated their own policy and really any sense of humanity.”