The Department of Justice asked a judge to rescind his Wednesday order allowing former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin to have samples from George Floyd's heart reexamined as part of an appeal.
U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson agreed in an order Monday to let the defense examine Floyd's heart tissue and fluid samples to test a theory that Floyd died in 2020 of a heart condition aggravated by a rare tumor, not — as prosecutors contend — from asphyxiation caused by the officer pressing his knee on Floyd's neck for 9 1/2 minutes.
Federal prosecutors said the request "defies belief" adding that "no legal basis exists for Defendant's discovery requests."
"It defies belief that, if Defendant had been aware of a weaker medical defense theory than the one already rejected by his state jury, he would have chosen trial again, in the face of overwhelming evidence and a Guidelines sentence of life," federal prosecutors argued.
Chauvin, 48, is looking to prove that Floyd died from a preexisting heart condition and not the impact of Chauvin's knee restraint. His lawyers believe Floyd may have died due to a "catecholamine crisis when his paraganglioma secreted excessive levels of catecholamines," according to Dec. 13 motion for discovery, with a "pulmonary edema" possibly being caused by Takotsubo's myocarditis, which is described by Chauvin's legal team as a type of a heart attack or acute heart failure.
Chauvin was convicted in state court on murder charges in 2021 and pleaded guilty later that year in federal court to violating Floyd's civil rights.
His federal defender for his appeal attempt, Robert Meyers, argued in his request that Chauvin's original attorney, Eric Nelson, failed to inform his client that an outside pathologist not directly involved in the case, Dr. William Schaetzel, of Topeka, Kansas, had contacted Nelson before Chauvin entered his plea and offered an unsolicited theory that Chauvin did not cause Floyd's death.
"Nelson provided ineffective assistance of counsel to Mr. Chauvin by failing to consult with him on this issue," Magnuson wrote in his order, citing Chauvin's legal claims.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.