George Floyd And Police Officer Who Killed Him Worked At Same NightClub
Maya Santamaria, a former club owner in south Minneapolis, says the cop who killed George Floyd worked security for her club up until the end of 2019.
Derek Chauvin reportedly worked at the El Nuevo Rodeo club on Lake Street. Santamaria says she owned the building for nearly two decades but sold it within the last few months. She also claims Floyd also worked security at her club, but couldn’t confirm the men knew each other or worked at the same time.
"Chauvin was our off-duty police for almost the entirety of the 17 years that we were open," Santamaria told ABC 5. "They were working together at the same time, it's just that Chauvin worked outside and the security guards were inside."
Santamaria says she didn’t initially recognize either Chauvin or Floyd but did after closer examination.
"My friend sent me (the video) and said this is your guy who used to work for you and I said, 'It's not him.' And then they did the closeup and that's when I said, 'Oh my God, that's him,'" she recalled. "I didn't recognize George as one of our security guys because he looked really different lying there like that."
Today (May 29), Chauvin was arrested and taken into custody by the Minneapolis Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. He’s been charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter.
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported that the Minnesota Department of Public Safety Commissioner John Harrington had sent out notification of the arrest Friday afternoon (May 29).
The arrest took place amidst three continuous days of social unrest in the city over Floyd’s death. Property all over the city has been burned and looted and at least one person was reported dead in the chaos.
