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By Bloomberg 
9h ago
Robert Iafolla, Ayanna Alexander and Ian Lopez
Prosecutors led by Minnesota Assistant Attorney General Matthew Frank are breaking the blue wall of silence in the trial of George Floyd’s accused killer, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.
Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds, which was “totally unnecessary,” Minneapolis Police Department Lt. Richard Zimmerman said when Frank questioned him on Friday.
“Keeping him face down on the ground and putting his knee on his neck during that time is simply unnecessary,” said Zimmerman, a homicide investigator called to the scene. “I didn’t see any reason why the officers felt they were in danger.”
Frank’s questioning of Zimmerman came as the state mounted its case against Chauvin’s use of force against Floyd, a central theme throughout the murder trial. The prosecution has used police officers and even paramedics and a firefighter to argue that Chauvin violated department standards by using force in detaining Floyd.
Retired Sgt. David Pleoger, who was Chauvin’s shift supervisor at the time, testified Thursday that officers should have facilitated Floyd once he was immobilized and provided him with necessary medical care. Prosecutors said they also plan to call Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison created a high-powered legal team to prosecute Chauvin, including a former high-ranking Obama administration attorney and a former prosecutor who closed one of the most infamous criminal cases in the state. But before Ellison brought in those lawyers from the private sector, he called in Frank, a longtime government attorney, to join the prosecution.
“Please note that the state of Minnesota will be represented by Assistant Attorney General Matthew Frank,” Ellison wrote in a court filing in June.
Frank has remained relatively anonymous despite traveling the state to head up murder cases and other major criminal prosecutions, often in small rural counties without the resources or experienced attorneys to handle them on his own.
It looks like Chauvin’s trial will change that. If you are remembered more as Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor who put Charles Manson behind bars, or Marcia Clark, the prosecutor who fell short in the OJ Simpson murder trial, it probably depends on the outcome of the case.
Frank has worked in the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office for 21 years, leading the office’s criminal division for the past 14 years. He previously served as a public defender and assistant county attorney.
Last week, prosecutors tried to poke holes in the possibility that Chauvin pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck as the defense disagreed with the witnesses’ experience and the possible police threat at the location of Floyd’s arrest.
Frank’s most notable exchange was with Zimmerman, who received ongoing training in the use of force in police tactics. Zimmerman analyzed how the use of force is applied. He said that Chauvin’s decision to kneel on Floyd’s neck was a use of deadly force.
“If your knee is on a person’s neck, that could kill them,” he said.
Zimmerman’s sentiments echo those of other law enforcement officers, paramedics and other state employees called to the stand in Chauvin’s murder trial.
“When Mr. Floyd no longer offered resistance to the officers, they could have ended his restraint,” Pleoger said.
In the last year alone, Frank has closed a handful of notable murder cases.
He helped Carlton County, population 36,000, by prosecuting James Montano for shooting his uncle and cousin after lurking on his father’s property. A jury convicted Montano of first degree murder and attempted first degree murder, putting him in prison for the rest of his life without the possibility of release.
Frank helped Todd County, with a population of 25,000, with the case of Dylan Bennett, accused of murdering his father and mother at their home. Bennett’s case had been scheduled for trial, but he later pleaded guilty to the murders and received two life sentences.
For Dodge County, with a population of 21,000, Frank led the case against Lois Riess, who murdered her husband in 2018 and then killed someone else while on the run in Florida. She pleaded guilty to the Florida murder, was extradited to Minnesota, and admitted to murdering her husband.
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