QUOTE OF THE DAY: "In Houston, (Reverent Al) Sharpton castigated the administration’s settlement cancellations, saying they were “tantamount to the Department of Justice and the president spitting on the grave of George Floyd.” “To wait to the anniversary and announce this, knowing this family was going to be brought back to the brokenheartedness of what happened shows the disregard and insensitivity of this administration,” he said. “But the reason that we will not be deterred is that Trump was president when George Floyd happened and he didn’t do anything then. We made things happen. And we’re going to make them happen again.”
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Events in Minneapolis centered around George Floyd Square, the intersection where police Officer Derek Chauvin used his knee to pin Floyd’s neck to the pavement for 9 1/2 minutes, even as Floyd cried “I can’t breathe.” By midday Sunday, a steady stream of people were paying their respects at a memorial in front of Cup Foods, where he was killed. Across the street, activists had set up a feeding area at an old gas station that has often served as a staging area since Floyd’s death. In the middle of the street, a fake pig's head was mounted on a stick. The head wore a police cap."
STORY: "Thousands mark 5th anniversary of George Floyd's murder as they call for justice and decry Trump," by Associated Press reporters Mark Vancleave and Kendria Lafleur, published on May 25, 2025.
GIST: "Police reform and civil-rights activists joined thousands of ordinary people Sunday to mark the fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s murder and decry the Trump administration for actions they say set their efforts back decades.
The Rev. Al Sharpton said at a graveside service with the dead man's family in Houston that Floyd, 46, represented all of those “who are defenseless against people who thought they could put their knee on our neck.”
He compared Floyd's killing to that of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Black child who was abducted, mutilated and slain in Mississippi in 1955 after being accused of offending a white woman.
“What Emmett Till was in his time, George Floyd has been for this time in history,” Sharpton said.
Site of his death
Events in Minneapolis centered around George Floyd Square, the intersection where police Officer Derek Chauvin used his knee to pin Floyd’s neck to the pavement for 9 1/2 minutes, even as Floyd cried “I can’t breathe.”
By midday Sunday, a steady stream of people were paying their respects at a memorial in front of Cup Foods, where he was killed. Across the street, activists had set up a feeding area at an old gas station that has often served as a staging area since Floyd’s death. In the middle of the street, a fake pig's head was mounted on a stick. The head wore a police cap.
Events started Friday with music, a street festival and a “self-care fair.” It culminated Sunday evening when hundreds gathered at the square for a candlelit vigil that included a worship service, a gospel concert and speeches calling for racial justice. A brass band then led the crowd on a short march through city streets.
Even with Minneapolis officials’ promises to remake the police department, some activists contend the progress has come at a glacial pace.
“We understand that change takes time,” Michelle Gross, president of Communities United Against Police Brutality, said in a statement last week. “However, the progress being claimed by the city is not being felt in the streets.”
Slow pace of change
Activists had hoped that the worldwide protests that followed Floyd's murder on May 25, 2020, would lead to national police reform and focus on racial justice.
Under President Joe Biden, the U.S. Justice Department had aggressively pushed for oversight of local police it had accused of widespread abuses.
But the Trump administration moved Wednesday to cancel settlements with Minneapolis and Louisville that called for an overhaul of their police departments following Floyd’s murder and the killing of Breonna Taylor.
Trump also has declared an end to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives within the federal government, and his administration is using federal funds as leverage to force local governments, universities and public school districts to do the same.
And Republican-led states have accelerated their efforts to stamp out DEI initiatives.
In Houston, Sharpton castigated the administration’s settlement cancellations, saying they were “tantamount to the Department of Justice and the president spitting on the grave of George Floyd.”
“To wait to the anniversary and announce this, knowing this family was going to be brought back to the brokenheartedness of what happened shows the disregard and insensitivity of this administration,” he said. “But the reason that we will not be deterred is that Trump was president when George Floyd happened and he didn’t do anything then. We made things happen. And we’re going to make them happen again.”
The future?
Detrius Smith of Dallas, who was visiting the Floyd memorial site with her three daughters and five grandchildren, told one granddaughter about how people globally united to decry racial injustice after Floyd's murder.
“It just really feels good, just really to see everybody out here celebrating the life, and the memories of George Floyd and just really remembering what happened,” Smith said. “We want to do everything we can to work together so everybody can have the same equal rights and everybody can move forward and not have something like that to continue to happen in this nation.”
Gail Ferguson of Minneapolis visited the site of Floyd's death on Sunday, as she has done every year on the anniversary of his death.
Ferguson, who is a professor at the University of Minnesota's Institute of Child Development leading an anti-racist parenting intervention program for white parents of young white children, said Floyd's murder brought attention to what she calls a racism pandemic.
“It exposed white supremacy, and it exposed the fragility and the passivity that can be part of the culture of whiteness,” she said."
The entire story can be read at:
cities-tied-to-george-floyd-mark-the-5th-20344670.php
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
———————————————————————————————
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
—————————————————————————————————
FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
