GAL PAL’S GRIEF
Sobs, tells how she & Floyd battled addiction
George Floyd’s girlfriend broke down in tears Thursday as she described their three-year relationship and opened up about the couple’s struggle with opioid addiction during the murder trial of fired Minneapolis cop Derek Chauvin.
Courteney Ross, who began sobbing almost immediately after she took the stand, said she met Floyd in August 2017 while he was working as a security guard at a Salvation Army shelter in downtown Minneapolis. Ross had gone to the shelter to meet her son’s father and was visibly upset while waiting in a lobby when Floyd approached her, she told the jury.
“He’s like, ‘Sis, you’re OK, sis?’ And I wasn’t OK,” she recalled before wiping away her tears. “He said, ‘Can I pray with you?’ ”
The two exchanged phone numbers and shared their first kiss moments later, Ross said.
It was the beginning of a relationship that ended when Floyd, 46, died in police custody on May 25 after Chauvin kneeled on his neck for more than nine minutes.
Ross, 45, testified about Floyd’s battle with drug addiction. Ross said she and Floyd had prescriptions for opioids to treat chronic pain, but she said they also bought additional drugs on the “black market.”
“Our story is a classic story of how people get addicted to opioids,” she said. “We got addicted and tried really hard to break that addiction many times.”
Under defense cross-examination, Ross talked about Floyd being hospitalized with an overdose in March 2020.
She said the substance that led to that overdose was likely not an opioid since it had a “different effect” on them. But when asked whether the drug was heroin, Ross said she had previously “speculated” it might have been but did not know that for a fact.
Prosecutors acknowledge that Floyd was under the influence when he died, and that an autopsy found fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system, but say his struggle with addiction did not cause his death or justify Chauvin’s actions.
The defense says Floyd’s history of drug use and underlying health conditions were culprits in
Floyd’s death, and that Chauvin acted in accordance with his police training.
Ross also revealed Thursday that Floyd’s nickname for her was “Mama,” the word he repeatedly used as he pleaded for his life during the fatal police encounter.
It’s unclear, however, who he was calling for as that was also how he referred to his late mother, Ross said.
Two paramedics took the witness stand Thursday and described their efforts to save Floyd’s life. Both told the court they saw no signs that Floyd was moving or breathing.
Paramedic Derek Smith said he believes the handcuffed man was already dead when he arrived.
“I walked up to the individual, noticed he wasn’t moving. I didn’t see any chest rise or fall on this individual,” Smith said.
He could not detect a pulse. “In lay terms, he was dead,” Smith said.
“When I showed up, he was deceased, and when I dropped him off at the hospital he was still in cardiac arrest,” he said.
The other paramedic, Seth Bravinder, said when he arrived, he also didn’t see Floyd moving or breathing, even “from a distance.”
Bravinder said Chauvin was still kneeling on Floyd’s neck while his partner checked for Floyd’s pulse. On their way to the hospital moments later, Bravinder said, the cardiac monitor inside the ambulance “flatlined.”
More than a dozen witnesses have testified so far, including several bystanders who expressed guilt for not being able to save Floyd’s life.
At least three of them became emotional during their testimony this week, including a 61-yearold man who was among the first bystanders on the scene and an off-duty firefighter who repeatedly begged Chauvin to let him check Floyd’s pulse.
Witness testimony in the high-profile case began Monday and is expected to continue for two to four weeks. Chauvin, the first of four ex-cops to face trial in the shocking Memorial Day incident, could face up to four decades in prison if he’s convicted. He’s charged with second-degree murder, second-degree manslaughter and third-degree murder.