The inmate charged in the knife attack on Derek Chauvin, the former officer convicted of murdering George Floyd, claims that symbolism is associated with the assault.

Law and Crime reports that the accused assailant, John Turscak, told the FBI that the Nov. 24, Black Friday, attack “was symbolic with the Black Lives Matter movement and the ‘Black Hand’ symbol associated with the Mexican Mafia criminal organization.”

Authorities charged Turscak, 52, with attempted murder, assault to commit murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, and assault resulting in serious bodily injury, CBS Minnesota reported.

Turscak, who is serving a 30-year prison sentence for committing crimes while working as a federal informant, used an “improvised knife” to stab Chauvin approximately 22 times at the law library of the Tuscon Federal Correctional Institution in Arizona, according to authorities.

The criminal complaint said guards intervened to halt the attack on Chauvin, who suffered “serious bodily injury.” Turscak told authorities that he would have killed Chauvin if guards didn’t intercede so quickly. 

Later, waiving his right to remain silent, he denied wanting to kill the ex-cop but said he thought about it for about a month because Chauvin is a high-profile inmate.

Emergency medical technicians reportedly “initiated lifesaving measures” after the assault and rushed Chauvin to a local hospital. He’s expected to survive.

Chauvin is serving a 21-year prison sentence at the federal prison.

A shocking video of Chauvin’s May 2020 arrest of Floyd, who is Black, went viral and ignited a global racial justice movement. It showed Chauvin kneeling on the handcuffed Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes, ignoring his plea to be allowed to breathe. 

Chauvin pleaded guilty in 2021 to federal charges of violating Floyd’s civil rights. In a separate state conviction, a jury in 2021 convicted Chauvin of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. 

Turscak was a member of the Mexican Mafia gang in the 1990s. He admitted to authorizing assaults on people who broke gang rules and to collecting money for the gang from drug dealers in exchange for protection and permission to traffic narcotics. Federal authorities recruited him to help them bring down the Mexican Mafia.