INSIDE: L.A. County leaders say verdict brings hope, but work on social justice issues must continue.
Accountability. A path to healing.
For one man and his family: Justice.
For the country: But one step in a larger journey toward racial justice, too long deferred.
Those were the reactions from Los Angeles County’s elected officials on Tuesday, April 20, in the wake of a Hennepin County jury finding former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin guilty of all three counts he faced — including murder — for killing George Floyd last year.
Floyd, a Black man, died May 25 when Chauvin kneeled on his neck for more than nine minutes. A crowd witnessed the killing. Smartphones captured it — and broadcast it across the world.
Protests swept the nation. The country’s latest reckoning with police brutality and systemic racism stretched into the summer. Then, in late March, Chauvin’s trial began. It went to the jury on Monday.
A captivated nation awoke on Tuesday. And waited.
Then, shortly after 2 p.m., Judge Peter Cahill opened a manila envelope containing the jury’s decision. He read the verdict. Guilty. And with that, those who for months — and, in fact, for years before Floyd’s death — marched in the streets, denounced systemic racism and advocated for police reform exhaled.
“Today, we let out a collective sigh that for George Floyd, and his family and supporters, the man who killed their loved one is going to be held accountable,” said Hilda L. Solis, chair of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. “This does not deflect from the terrible fact that we have so many more people who were taken from their families by law enforcement, like Breonna Taylor, Daunte Wright, Adam Toledo, and those here in LA County.”
The responses from Los Angeles County’s local leaders — in statements, via email or on Twitter — echoed sentiments heard across the nation:
There was compassion and continued mourning for those who knew Floyd. Declarations of solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. Paeans to justice.
“Though his life was senselessly cut short, Mr. Floyd’s legacy lives on through our collective work and advocacy to reimagine policing across this country,” said Los Angeles City Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas. “So, while today’s verdict will not bring George Floyd back, my hope is that his family will know that he has forever changed this nation for the better.”
One of the region’s top law enforcement officials, Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva, said what many around the nation, particularly in Black communities, have long demanded: When police officers break the law, they will be held accountable.
“As we have all seen with the verdict in the Derek Chauvin case, we must have faith in the judicial process, he said. “If a crime is committed, regardless of who the perpetrator is, they will be brought to justice.”
But other county leaders suggested decisions such as Tuesday’s guilty verdict have often been exceptions that belie rather than confirm faith in the system.
“The jury delivered accountability, but the future of equality rests squarely in America’s hands,” said L.A. County District Attorney George Gascon. “Today’s verdict is a critical step in the ongoing march towards restoring public trust in our criminal justice system.”
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti was more pointed.
“For any of us who have lived through bad verdicts where justice was denied, we have seen too painfully and felt too painfully what it means for our country to stagger backwards,” he said. “So for today, for us to step forward even in the midst of our pain, it’s a good day.”
His city knows that feeling all too well.
In nine days, Los Angeles will mark the 29th anniversary of four LAPD officers getting acquitted on charges of assaulting Rodney King. The jury’s decision in that case sparked the now-infamous Los Angeles riots.
King’s encounter with the LAPD a year before, like Floyd’s death, was caught on video.
“Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd in the light of day, with a maliciousness caught on tape far too many times in our history,” said L.A. Councilman Joe Buscaino, whose 15th district stretches from San Pedro to Watts. “In taking the life of one of the people he was sworn to protect, Chauvin disrespected the solemnity of his duty in the worst possible way.
“I am so glad that the jury said that Black Lives Matter,” he added, “but this is just one day, on a very long journey to the reckoning that we must face and the healing that we need.”
Some public agencies have already begun that reckoning.
In January, for example, California’s Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory Board issued a report urging law enforcement agencies to review officers’ social media, cellphones and computers for racist content that could contribute to Black people getting stopped disproportionately by police.
That report, the board’s fourth annual, said people who were perceived as Black were more than twice as likely to be stopped as their percentage of the population would suggest.
Last summer, multiple local police agencies throughout the state suspended the controversial sleeper hold amid the wave of Black Lives Matter protests Floyd’s death catalyzed.
And in Long Beach, the City Council approved a 112-page report as part of its Racial Equity and Reconciliation Initiative. That report has 32 criminal justice-related action plans, including reimagining a police oversight body, exploring non-police alternatives to emergency response and redesigning police tactics.
Despite those efforts, however, local leaders on Tuesday used the verdict in Minnesota as a way to publicly advocate for further reforms.
“Justice has been served today,” Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia said. “We know there is so much more to do to break down racial injustice and achieve equity for all.”
That was the apparent consensus:
Tuesday, the local leaders said, brought relief and a measure of hope.
After that, the march will continue.