Keith Ellison took over the Minnesota attorney general's office last year vowing to spend more time helping state attorneys try complex cases. He also helped lead a yearlong study into the root causes of deadly police encounters — like the one that took George Floyd's life in Minneapolis last week.
The two agendas converged Sunday when Gov. Tim Walz asked Ellison to take over the prosecution of Derek Chauvin, a fired white officer accused of choking Floyd, an unarmed black man, with a knee to his neck. Now, one of the nation's loudest civil rights voices is at the center of its most intense police brutality case in decades.
The move came after six days of protests over Floyd's death, including demands for Chauvin's immediate arrest and prosecution. Among the protest targets was Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman, who filed the murder charges after five days. But Floyd's family and some prominent supporters, including members of the Minneapolis City Council, wanted a change. After several days of deliberation, Walz announced Sunday that Ellison, a former defense lawyer and congressman, would take over the case.
If there was political pressure in the high-profile case, state Sen. Jeff Hayden, a Minneapolis Democrat who represents the area where Floyd was killed, said it came "directly from the constituents." He said some members of the community have lost faith in Freeman's office, whose record of prosecuting police officers comes down to the recent conviction of Mohamed Noor, a black officer in the 2017 shooting of a white woman who had called 911 for help. Many protesters also were outraged that Freeman didn't bring more serious murder charges against Chauvin — or bring any charges so far against the other three officers involved in Floyd's arrest.
"I know Mike very well; I don't think he's a bad person," said Hayden, who wants police reform to be a priority when the Legislature returns this month for a special session. "But I think he's very much out of touch with the community that he serves. I think you saw that play out in his news conference when he, in a very boisterous and braggadocious way, argued that he is the only person to put a cop in jail — and that cop happened to be a person of African descent."
Freeman's only statement since the unusual step of putting Ellison in charge has been that he had asked for Ellison's help. "There have been recent developments in the facts of the case where the help and expertise of the attorney general would be valuable," Freeman said.
A spokesperson for Freeman's office referred questions Monday to the Attorney General's Office. An attorney for Chauvin also declined to comment Monday.
The case surrounding Floyd also has highlighted the work Ellison and Minnesota Public Safety Commissioner John Harrington have led over the past year with a task force on police brutality. Hayden and other DFL lawmakers are now pressing for a special session of the Minnesota Legislature to take up the panel's recommendations, which had been shelved during the Legislature's regular session.
