Eight minority corrections officers who were barred from guarding or having any other contact with former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin during his stay at the Ramsey County jail last summer are suing their employer, alleging discrimination and creating a hostile work environment.
Chauvin was booked at the county jail on May 29, the same day he was charged in the death of George Floyd. He is expected to stand trial March 8 on charges of second-degree murder and manslaughter.
As Chauvin arrived, all officers of color were ordered to a separate floor, and a supervisor forbid a Black sergeant from bringing Chauvin to his cell, solely because of their race, according to the 30-page lawsuit filed in Ramsey County District Court on Tuesday morning.
The officers — who identify as Black, Hispanic and Pacific-Islander — said those orders by the white jail superintendent amounted to segregation and implied they could not be trusted around Chauvin because they are not white.
“Credibility is critical to maintaining safety in a jail environment,” according to the lawsuit filed by Minneapolis attorney Lucas Castor. The “segregation order tarnished [Ramsey County’s] credibility and reputation and prohibited them from completing their job duties professionally.”
The lawsuit comes roughly eight months after the same group of officers filed discrimination charges with the state’s Department of Human Rights about the incident. The charges were expected to automatically trigger a state investigation, but Castor told the Star Tribune it never moved forward — and lawyers requested the state close the administrative case so they could pursue legal action in state court.
A MDHR spokesman confirmed that the case was closed at the charging parties’ request, before a determination was ever issued. He declined to say how far along the investigation had gotten or whether one was ever started.
After initially denying that such a segregation order took place, a spokesman for the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office acknowledged the decision and announced that the superintendent had been temporarily demoted while the agency conducted an internal investigation. It’s not immediately clear what that investigation found.
In explaining his actions, jail Superintendent Steve Lydon later told superiors that he was informed Chauvin would be arriving in 10 minutes, and made a call “to protect and support” minority employees by shielding them from Chauvin.
“Out of care and concern, and without the comfort of time, I made a decision to limit exposure to employees of color to a murder suspect who could potentially aggravate those feelings,” Lydon reportedly said in a statement given during an internal investigation and provided by the Sheriff’s Office to the Star Tribune.
Two officers also alleged that they witnessed surveillance footage of a white female lieutenant who was granted “special access” to Chauvin’s cell, where she sat on his bunk and allowed him to use her cellphone — a significant policy violation.
The Sheriff’s Office previously declined to comment on that allegation. Chauvin was moved to the Hennepin County jail on May 31 and for security reasons transferred again to the Oak Park Heights maximum security prison, where he stayed in isolation for several months before making bail.
This is a breaking news story. Check back at Startribune.com for updates.
Liz Sawyer
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Yep, Minneapolis everything is “racist”, so why don’t we move you to an “island utopia”, where there are no police and crime is rampant. Your island, will be the only “perfect place” on the Earth, with rampant crime, as you will not have a police force.
YOU could move them all to a nation where ONLY BLACKS were, and they’d STILL find something to complain ‘racism’ about.
It seems people are getting overtly political and causing more issues when it comes to race. It all has to stop. One way or another it has to be realized people are racial and evil and others are not. We work together the best we can and need to rid ourselves of the news media and the liberal Democratic hate mongers, who use this to control people and turn them against one another. I hope these LEO’s get a taste of justice and that the superintendent quits being an idiot.
In spite of what the Al Sharpton Democrat controlled media put out to stoke the racial hatred, autopsy has shown George Floyd died of a Fentanyl overdose, a substance which if it was not self-induced into his blood stream would have enabled him to survive anything that the police did to him that day. For the very same reason that police color did not cause his death, should be the very same reason Cops of color can be trusted to guard one of their own gone astray. Cops were and are not the problem. The ability or out right refusal of blacks to embrace the concept of self-government and self- accountability ARE. Until then this nation will remain divided by class, but race will just remain the beguiling excuse. Cops are not the problem, the manipulative media who refuses to report the facts, and one of the two major political parties are.
We need to all admit that we have been racist at one time or another in our life and sin, but repent and ask for forgiveness from God!! 2 Timothy 3:1-4
TILL the left, STOPS seeing the racist card being ALLOWED TO WORK though, they won’t ever STOP USING IT…
Prior to this moment Minneapolos might have had a claim to not being racist was shot down by the jail superintendent in a city run by DEMOCRATS that can in no way be construed as anything but systemic racism. The only other conclusion would be that the superintendent is one of the very few in the police department. Either way it does not look good in the eyes of the public.
I wonder, IF those guards get their way, and Cauvin, winds up being found killed, WILL ANY CHARGES come to those guards?