Judge Cahill reinstates a contested third-degree-murder charge after the state supreme court refuses to consider a pretrial challenge.
The likelihood that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin will be convicted of murdering George Floyd has increased significantly.
On Wednesday, the Minnesota supreme court declined to delay the trial in order to consider the validity of the third-degree-murder charge, which alleges that Chauvin exhibited depraved indifference in causing Floyd’s death. As a result, the trial judge, Peter Cahill, reinstated the charge this morning, as jury selection continued. Judge Cahill had thrown the charge out last October, while upholding second-degree-murder and manslaughter counts against Chauvin, who is being tried separately from the other three former police officers implicated in Floyd’s death.