A moment of justice

The conviction handed out to police officer Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis, on multiple charges resulting in the death of George Floyd in May 2020, is being celebrated by people across the US. This is very understandable. After all, justice has been denied for so long to the African-American community that has suffered innumerable deaths at the hands of the American police each year. Indeed, merely minutes before the verdict came in, a teenage girl, also black, was killed in Ohio by the police. The other three officers charged in George Floyd’s death go to trial in August. This verdict is significant in the sense that there have been previous incidents in which juries decided not to indict police officers involved in murders.

The present moment is indeed a landmark, and shows that the protests that followed the killing of George Floyd, captured vividly on video, showing the policeman – Chauvin – kneeling over Floyd as he said his last words, ‘I can’t breathe’, have been written down in memories and in history. With this verdict, the legal process of prosecutions has taken an important step forward and the demand for justice has met with an initial stage of success. There have been many occasions in America lately in which encounters between black people and the police ended fatally. Floyd’s case is turning out to be slightly different as public outrage in the past did not always translate to criminal indictment. The police officers responsible in such cases have usually gotten away. In some other cases, the police drop charges or reach plea agreements as happens in Pakistan.

The conviction of Derek Chauvin is unlikely to be a turning moment. But it is an extremely important one. Perhaps it will demonstrate to the American people that justice is a possibility in the US of today. Perhaps it will demonstrate to other Americans that black lives do indeed matter, as the slogan says. For now, they can only hope further campaigns can bring about a change in thinking and more equality for the black population of America. There are lessons in this case that are instructive for such episodes in Pakistan too. We have not seen many law enforcers held responsible for negligence or for overstepping of their authority. Such cases – from America to Pakistan – give us grim reminders that vulnerable common people must be protected and no abuse of power should be allowed to go unpunished.