An attorney for the former Minneapolis police officer charged in George Floyd’s death said Monday that he’s “gravely concerned” that the announcement of a $27 million settlement for Floyd’s family makes it impossible for his client to get a fair trial.Defense attorney Eric Nelson asked for a continuance and raised the possibility of renewing his previously unsuccessful motion to move Derek Chauvin's trial to another city.“I am gravely concerned with the news that broke on Friday,” Nelson said, adding that the settlement announcement "has incredible potential to taint the jury pool.”Prosecutor Steve Schleicher said the state had no control over Mayor Jacob Frey and the City Council, who announced the settlement on Friday.Absent a delay or change of venue, Nelson urged Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill to consider giving both sides extra strikes to remove potential jurors who might be biased, and to recall the seven jurors already seated to ask them how the settlement affected their view of the case.But Schleicher said the jurors selected promised they could decide the case based only on evidence presented at trial and he urged the court to “take a step back” and determine whether there's an actual problem before deciding on solutions.“You would agree it’s unfortunate, right?” Cahill asked.“It’s certainly not my preference, your honor,” Schleicher replied, adding that it wasn’t clear to him whether news of the settlement “cuts” in favor of the prosecution or the defense.“The problem is, it cuts,” Cahill said.Cahill said he would take the request for a continuance under advisement, but that he didn’t think it would be appropriate to grant additional strikes to either side. He said he would likely recall the seven previously seated jurors for further questioning.“I wish city officials would stop talking about this case so much, but at the same time I don’t find any evil intent that they were trying to tamper with this case,” Cahill said. The judge has already instructed members of the jury pool to avoid all news coverage about the case.Chauvin is charged with murder and manslaughter. Attorneys have been questioning potential jurors to settle on 12 who will deliberate and two to be alternates.Floyd, a Black man, was declared dead on May 25 after Chauvin, who is white, pressed his knee against his neck for about nine minutes. Floyd’s death sparked sometimes violent protests in Minneapolis and beyond and led to a national reckoning on racial justice. Chauvin is charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and manslaughter. At least three weeks have been set aside for jury selection.In the midst of jury selection, Minneapolis last week agreed to pay $27 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit from Floyd’s family over his death. Floyd family attorney Ben Crump called it the largest pretrial settlement ever for a civil rights claim. The settlement includes $500,000 for the south Minneapolis neighborhood that includes the 38th and Chicago intersection that has been blocked by barricades since Floyd's death, with a massive metal sculpture and murals in his honor. The city didn’t immediately say how that money would be spent.The first potential juror questioned Monday volunteered that she had “inadvertently” heard about the $27 million settlement, and that she knew it was a record. She said she presumed it meant the city didn’t feel it would prevail in the civil case.“When I hear that I almost gasped at the amount,” she said, adding that she couldn't promise she could disregard it. Cahill excused her and said he appreciated her honesty.The process of questioning jurors has been long and nuanced, with attorneys for both sides trying to ferret out potential jurors who may be biased. The defense is striking people who tell the court they already have strong feelings about Chauvin’s guilt. The prosecution, meanwhile, is blocking potential jurors who seem inclined to give police the benefit of the doubt.The seven jurors selected so far include five men and two women. Four of the jurors are white, one is multiracial, one is Black and one is Hispanic. The jurors range in age from their 20s to their 50s.The earliest opening statements would begin is March 29.Three other former officers face an August trial on charges of aiding and abetting second-degree murder and manslaughter.

Video above: Witnesses testify in Chauvin trialGeorge Floyd's girlfriend cried on the witness stand Thursday as she told the story of how they first met in 2017 at a Salvation Army shelter where Floyd was a security guard with “this great Southern voice, raspy.”“May I tell the story?” 45-year-old Courteney Ross asked on the fourth day of former Officer Derek Chauvin's murder trial. “It’s one of my favorite stories to tell.”Prosecutors put her on the stand as part of an effort to humanize Floyd in front of the jury and portray him as more than a crime statistic.Ross said she had gone to the shelter because her sons' father was staying there. She said she became upset because the father was not coming to the lobby to discuss their son's birthday. Floyd came over to check on her.“Floyd has this great Southern voice, raspy. He was like, `Sis, you OK, sis?'” Ross recalled. “I was tired. We've been through so much, my sons and I, and (for) this kind person just to come up and say, ‘Can I pray with you?’ ... it was so sweet. At the time, I had lost a lot of faith in God."Ross also explained that both she and Floyd struggled to overcome opioid addiction.Minnesota is a rarity in explicitly permitting such “spark of life” testimony ahead of a verdict. Defense attorneys often complain that such testimony allows prosecutors to play on jurors' emotions.The testimony came a day after prosecutors played extensive video footage: Security-camera scene of people joking around inside a convenience store, and bystander and police bodycam video of officers pulling Floyd from his SUV at gunpoint and struggling to put him in a squad car before they put him on the ground. It also showed Floyd being loaded into an ambulance.Chauvin, 45, who is white, is charged with murder and manslaughter, accused of killing the 46-year-old Black man by kneeling on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes, 29 seconds, as he lay face-down in handcuffs. The most serious charge against the now-fired officer carries up to 40 years in prison.Floyd's struggle with three police officers trying to arrest him, seen on body-camera video, included Floyd's panicky cries of “I'm sorry, I'm sorry” and “I'm claustrophobic!” as the officers tried to push Floyd into the back of a police SUV.At one point, Floyd bucks forward, throwing his upper body out of the car. Officers eventually give up, and Floyd thanks them — and then is taken to the ground, facedown and handcuffed. Chauvin knee pins his neck, another officer's knee holds his back and a third officer holds his legs, with the officers talking calmly about whether he might be on drugs.“He wouldn’t get out of the car. He just wasn’t following instructions,” Officer Thomas Lane was recorded saying. Lane also asked twice if the officers should roll Floyd on his side, and later said he thinks Floyd is passing out. Another officer checked Floyd's wrist for a pulse and said he couldn’t find one.The officers' video was part of a mountain of footage and witness testimony Wednesday showing how Floyd's alleged attempt to pass a phony $20 bill at a neighborhood market last May escalated into tragedy.When Floyd was finally taken away by paramedics, Charles McMillian, a 61-year-old bystander who recognized Chauvin from the neighborhood, told the officer he didn't respect what Chauvin had done.“That’s one person’s opinion," Chauvin could be heard responding. "We gotta control this guy ’cause he’s a sizable guy... and it looks like he’s probably on something.”Floyd was 6-feet, 4-inches and 223 pounds, according to the autopsy, which also found fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system. Chauvin's lawyer said the officer is 5-feet, 9 inches and 140 pounds.Floyd’s death, along with the harrowing bystander video of him gasping for breath as onlookers yelled at Chauvin to get off him, triggered sometimes violent protests around the world and a reckoning over racism and police brutality across the U.S.The defense has argued that Chauvin did what he was trained to do and that Floyd’s death was not caused by the officer’s knee, as prosecutors contend, but by Floyd’s illegal drug use, heart disease, high blood pressure and the adrenaline flowing through his body.Events spun out of control earlier that day soon after Floyd allegedly handed a cashier at Cup Foods, 19-year-old Christopher Martin, a counterfeit bill for a pack of cigarettes.Martin testified Wednesday that he watched Floyd’s arrest outside with “disbelief -- and guilt.”“If I would’ve just not tooken the bill, this could’ve been avoided,” Martin lamented, joining the burgeoning list of witnesses who expressed a sense of helplessness and lingering guilt over Floyd's death.___Webber reported from Fenton, Michigan.

Warning: This live video may contain violent and/or disturbing images with strong language. Viewer discretion is advised. George Floyd died of a lack of oxygen from the way he was held down by police, a retired forensic pathologist testified Friday at former Officer Derek Chauvin's murder trial.The testimony of Lindsey Thomas, who retired in 2017 from the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's office in Minneapolis, bolstered the accounts of other experts on Thursday who rejected the defense theory that Floyd’s drug use and underlying health problems killed him.Thomas did not work on Floyd's case but agreed with the findings of her former colleague Hennepin County Medical Examiner Andrew Baker that Floyd died from cardiopulmonary arrest complicated by the way law enforcement restrained him and compressed his neck.But she went further in saying "the primary mechanism of death is asphyxia, or low oxygen.""This is a death where both the heart and lungs stopped working. The point is, it's due to law enforcement subdual, restraint and compression," Thomas said. "The activities of the law enforcement officers resulted in Mr. Floyd’s death."Thomas said she reached her conclusion primarily from the video, which showed Floyd "in a position where he was unable to adequately breathe.”The autopsy itself ruled out heart attack, aneurysm, COVID-19 and other factors, and Thomas said the video showed it was not a fentanyl overdose death.Her testimony came a day after other medical experts also said Floyd died of a lack of oxygen."A healthy person subjected to what Mr. Floyd was subjected to would have died," prosecution witness Dr. Martin Tobin, a lung and critical care specialist at the Edward Hines Jr. VA Hospital and Loyola University’s medical school in Illinois, testified Thursday.Tobin said the lack of oxygen resulted in brain damage and caused Floyd's heart to stop.Chauvin, 45, is charged with murder and manslaughter in Floyd’s death May 25 after kneeling on him for what prosecutors say was 9 1/2 minutes. Floyd was arrested outside a neighborhood market after being accused of trying to pass a counterfeit $20 bill.Bystander video of Floyd crying that he couldn’t breathe as onlookers yelled at the white officer to get off him sparked protests and scattered violence around the U.S.Chauvin attorney Eric Nelson has argued that Chauvin did what he was trained to do and that Floyd’s death was caused by illegal drugs and underlying medical problems, including high blood pressure and heart disease. An autopsy found fentanyl and methamphetamine in his system.Using easy-to-understand language to explain medical concepts and even loosening his necktie to illustrate a point, Tobin told the jury that Floyd's breathing was severely constricted while Chauvin and two other Minneapolis officers held the 46-year-old Black man down on his stomach with his hands cuffed behind him and his face jammed against the ground.Tobin, analyzing images of the three officers restraining Floyd for what prosecutors say was almost 9 1/2 minutes, testified that Chauvin's knee was “virtually on the neck” more than 90% of the time.He said several other factors also made it difficult for Floyd to breathe: officers lifting up on the suspect's handcuffs, the hard pavement, his prone position, his turned head and a knee on his back.Tobin also testified that just because Floyd was talking and can be seen moving on video doesn't mean he was breathing adequately. He said a leg movement seen in the footage was an involuntary sign of a fatal brain injury, and that a person can continue to speak until the airway narrows to 15%, after which "you are in deep trouble."Officers can be heard on video telling Floyd that if he can talk, he can breathe.