Last month, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin requested the Minnesota Supreme Court to reconsider his conviction for murdering George Floyd. But now, state prosecutors are calling on the high court to reject his request.
“Petitioner received a fair trial, and received the benefit of a fulsome appellate review,” the attorney general’s office wrote in a filing on Tuesday. “It is time to bring this case to a close.”
Chauvin’s request came following the Minnesota Court of Appeals rejecting his legal team’s argument that his trial was unfair.
Chauvin was found guilty of second-degree murder in relation to Floyd’s 2020 death, and as a result, he was sentenced to 22 ½ years in prison.
William Morhman, a defense attorney for Chauvin, has argued that the case should have been moved out of Minneapolis, saying that growing publicity around the trial made it impossible for a fair verdict to be reached.
Another point made in Chauvin’s request was that one of the jurors participated in a civil rights event commemorating the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s March on Washington, only months after Floyd was murdered.
On the other side, prosecutors argue that Chauvin should not be given a retrial as he received “one of the most thorough and transparent criminal proceedings in the history of this nation.”
The Minnesota Supreme Court has not decided if it will hear Chauvin’s appeal or let the Court of Appeals ruling stand.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.