Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd in 2020, has filed an appeal with the Minnesota Supreme Court after a lower court judge rejected his bid for a new trial. The move marks the latest chapter in one of the most politically charged criminal cases in modern American history, and it forces the state's top court to weigh questions about juror misconduct, pretrial publicity, and whether Chauvin received a fair trial in a city that was, at the time, on fire.
Chauvin's legal team filed the appeal after the Minnesota Court of Appeals upheld his 2021 conviction on second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter charges. He was sentenced to 22 and a half years in state prison. His attorneys have pressed several claims, chief among them that the trial should not have been held in Hennepin County given the extraordinary level of pretrial publicity and community pressure surrounding the case.
The defense has also zeroed in on juror misconduct allegations. Chauvin's attorneys pointed to one juror in particular, arguing that the juror was not forthcoming during the selection process about prior exposure to the case and participation in events connected to the broader George Floyd movement. The defense contended this tainted the jury and denied Chauvin his constitutional right to an impartial panel.
Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill, who presided over the original trial, denied Chauvin's request for a new trial. Cahill also denied the defense's earlier motion to move the trial out of Minneapolis. The Minnesota Court of Appeals subsequently affirmed both the conviction and the denial of a new trial, prompting Chauvin's team to escalate the fight to the state Supreme Court.
The juror issue has dogged the case since shortly after the verdict. Juror Brandon Mitchell was photographed wearing a T-shirt with the words "Get Your Knee Off Our Necks" at a march in Washington, D.C., months before the trial. Mitchell said the event was a commemoration of the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, not a protest related to Floyd's death. During jury selection, Mitchell answered "no" when asked whether he had attended any Floyd-related protests or marches.
Chauvin's defense team has argued that Mitchell's answers were misleading and that his presence at the event, regardless of how he characterized it, demonstrated bias. The trial court and the appellate court both found that Mitchell's conduct did not warrant a new trial, concluding that his answers during voir dire were not dishonest enough to undermine the verdict. The Minnesota Supreme Court will now have the final word on whether that conclusion holds.
The appeal was first reported by Fox News, which noted that Chauvin's petition asks the high court to review the appellate decision in full. The filing does not guarantee the Supreme Court will take the case. The justices have discretion over whether to grant review.
Chauvin's defense has long maintained that holding the trial in Minneapolis made a fair proceeding impossible. The city experienced widespread rioting, arson, and looting in the days after Floyd's death on May 25, 2020. The National Guard was deployed. Businesses were destroyed. The Third Precinct police station was overrun and burned.
The violence extended well beyond the immediate aftermath. In one case tied to the unrest, the brother of a late NFL player was sentenced to five years for setting fire to a post office during the Minneapolis riots, illustrating the scale of destruction that gripped the city.
During the trial itself, the courthouse was surrounded by fencing, concrete barriers, and armed soldiers. Protests continued outside. The defense argued that jurors could not escape the atmosphere of intimidation, even if they followed instructions to avoid media coverage. Judge Cahill acknowledged the "problematic" environment but ultimately ruled that a change of venue was not required, finding that jurors could be adequately screened.
The city of Minneapolis reached a $27 million civil settlement with Floyd's family during jury selection, a move the defense called prejudicial. Cahill denied a mistrial motion over the settlement's timing but called the announcement "incredibly disturbing."
Chauvin faces two separate legal tracks. In addition to his state conviction, he pleaded guilty in 2021 to a federal civil rights charge for depriving Floyd of his rights. He was sentenced to 21 years in federal prison, with the federal and state sentences running concurrently. He is currently incarcerated in a federal facility.
The federal plea dealt with both the Floyd incident and a separate 2017 encounter in which Chauvin restrained a 14-year-old boy by pressing a knee into the teenager's back. Chauvin admitted in the federal plea that he willfully deprived both individuals of their constitutional rights.
His state appeal does not affect the federal sentence. Even if the Minnesota Supreme Court were to grant a new trial and Chauvin were acquitted on state charges, he would remain in federal custody. The practical effect of a successful state appeal would be limited, but the legal and symbolic stakes remain high for both sides.
The Floyd case reshaped American politics in ways that are still playing out. The movement that followed Floyd's death drove calls to defund police departments, prompted corporate diversity pledges, and became a defining issue of the 2020 presidential campaign. Minneapolis itself voted on a ballot measure to replace its police department with a "Department of Public Safety," though voters rejected the proposal in 2021.
Some political figures who aligned themselves with the movement during its peak have since sought to distance themselves from those positions. In one notable example, a Kamala Harris-endorsed House candidate quietly scrubbed BLM-era social media posts as a competitive race tightened, reflecting the shifting political winds around the issue.
For conservatives, the Chauvin case has raised persistent questions about whether the justice system can function fairly when a defendant becomes the focal point of a national protest movement. The defense's core argument, that Chauvin could not receive an impartial trial in Minneapolis in 2021, speaks to a concern that extends beyond this single case.
Minneapolis also became a flashpoint for press freedom during the protests. In a separate incident, video appeared to show that an assault on a conservative journalist was coordinated in advance, raising alarm about the climate of hostility toward certain media figures covering the unrest.
The court's first decision is procedural: whether to accept the case at all. Chauvin's petition for review is discretionary, meaning the justices can decline to hear it without explanation. If they do take it up, they will likely focus on the juror misconduct claim and the venue question, the two strongest threads in the defense's argument.
On the juror issue, the court would need to determine whether Mitchell's answers during voir dire were materially false and whether any deception, if found, was enough to deny Chauvin a fair trial. Courts generally set a high bar for overturning verdicts on juror misconduct grounds, requiring proof that the juror was actually biased, not merely that a question was answered imprecisely.
On venue, the defense faces an uphill battle. Minnesota courts have historically been reluctant to grant changes of venue, and appellate courts typically defer to trial judges who observed the jury selection process firsthand. Chauvin's team will need to convince the Supreme Court that Cahill's decision was not just debatable but legally wrong.
The question of judicial decision-making in high-profile cases has drawn broader scrutiny in recent years. Justice Neil Gorsuch recently pushed back on critics who question the courts' independence, insisting the system is functioning as designed. Whether the Minnesota Supreme Court's handling of Chauvin's appeal reinforces or undermines that confidence will depend on how seriously the justices engage with the defense's claims.
The Minnesota Supreme Court has not announced whether it will grant review or set a briefing schedule. If the court takes the case, oral arguments and a decision could stretch well into 2025 or beyond. Chauvin, now 49, continues to serve his sentence at a federal facility.
Floyd's family and their attorneys have consistently maintained that the conviction was just and that the trial was conducted fairly despite the difficult circumstances. Prosecutors have argued at every stage that the evidence against Chauvin was overwhelming, that the jury was properly vetted, and that the venue was appropriate.
Whether the state's highest court agrees will not change the federal sentence Chauvin is already serving. But it will answer a question that has hung over this case from the beginning: whether a man can get a fair trial in a city that had already rendered its verdict in the streets.
