George Floyd Trial: Store Cashier Expresses ‘Disbelief, Guilt’ Over Black Man’s Death

The convenience store cashier to whom George Floyd handed a counterfeit $ 20 bill, triggering the black man’s unfortunate encounter with police, testified Wednesday that he viewed Floyd’s arrest outside with “disbelief and guilt.”

“If I just hadn’t agreed to the bill, this could have been avoided,” lamented 19-year-old Christopher Martin at the murder trial of Officer Derek Chauvin, joining the growing list of viewers who expressed a sense of helplessness and persistent guilt. about Floyd’s death last May.

Prosecutors used Martin to help establish the sequence of events that led to the arrest, and they also played store security footage showing Floyd at Cup Foods for about 10 minutes, adding to the mountain of videos that they document what happened.

Martin said he immediately believed that the $ 20 Floyd gave him in exchange for a pack of cigarettes was fake, but he accepted it even though the store’s policy was that the amount would be deducted from his paycheck.

Martin said he initially planned to just put the invoice on his “account,” but then thought about it and told a manager, who sent Martin outside to ask Floyd to come back to the store.

He said a manager asked another employee to call police after Floyd and a passenger in Floyd’s vehicle twice refused to return to the store to resolve the issue.

Later, Floyd was arrested outside, where Chauvin pinned his knee to the man’s neck for what prosecutors said was 9 minutes, 29 seconds, while Floyd in handcuffs lay face down on the pavement. Floyd, 46, was later pronounced dead at a hospital.

Martin said that inside the store, he asked Floyd if he played baseball, and Floyd said he played soccer, but it took Floyd a while to answer, so “it would look like he was high.” But he described Floyd as friendly and talkative.

The defense has argued that the now-fired white officer did what his training told him to do and that Floyd’s death was not caused by Chauvin’s knee on his neck, as prosecutors contend, but by a combination of drug use. illegal, heart disease, discharge. blood pressure and adrenaline flowing through your body.

Martin came out while people were gathering on the sidewalk and yelling at officers, then he called his mother, who lived in an upstairs apartment, and told her to stay inside before he picked up her phone and started. to record.

He said he saw Officer Tou Thao push one of his co-workers, and Martin said he also stopped another man who was trying to defend himself after being pushed by Thao.

Martin later deleted his recording, explaining that the ambulance did not take the quickest route to the hospital, thus he thought Floyd had died.

“I just didn’t want to have to show it (the video) to anyone,” he said.

Chauvin, 45, is charged with murder and manslaughter. The most serious charge against him carries up to 40 years in prison.

Floyd’s death, along with the heartbreaking video of him, sparked sometimes violent protests around the world and a settling of scores on racism and police brutality in the US.

On Tuesday, a parade of witnesses testified that they and other bystanders were angered when they repeatedly begged Chauvin to remove the knee from Floyd’s neck, but Chauvin refused to relax and Thao forced those on the sidewalk to step back and they tried to intervene.

One of the people who stumbled upon the scene, Minneapolis firefighter Genevieve Hansen, cried as she recalled being prevented from using her EMT training to help Floyd.

“There was a man who was being killed,” said Hansen, who testified in his dress uniform and detailed his emergency training. “He could have provided medical care in the best possible way. And this human was denied that right.”

Chauvin appeared indifferent to her pleas, according to bystanders, including the teenager who shot the video that sparked the nationwide protests, 18-year-old Darnella Frazier. He said Chauvin gave viewers a “cold” and “ruthless” look.

The testimony of the prosecution witnesses was apparently intended to show that Chauvin had multiple opportunities to think about what he was doing and change course.

But Chauvin’s attorney, Eric Nelson, also repeatedly tried to present evidence that bystanders were becoming agitated, in an apparent attempt to show that the police were distracted by what they perceived as a growing and increasingly hostile crowd.

The witnesses stated that no passer-by interfered with the police.

Testimony Wednesday morning was briefly interrupted when a juror stood up, raised his hand and pointed at the door. She later told the judge that she had been feeling stressed and had trouble sleeping, but told the judge that she could continue.