- An inmate was charged Friday with stabbing ex-Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin.
- Chauvin was convicted of murdering George Floyd and was serving his sentence in a federal jail in Arizona.
- The inmate, who nearing the tip of a 30-year sentence, was accused of planning the assault.
An incarcerated former gang member and one-time FBI informant was charged Friday with tried homicide within the stabbing of ex-Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin at a federal jail in Arizona.
John Turscak stabbed Chauvin 22 instances on the Federal Correctional Establishment in Tucson and stated he would have killed Chauvin had correctional officers not responded so shortly, federal prosecutors stated.
Turscak, serving a 30-year sentence for crimes dedicated whereas a member of the Mexican Mafia gang, informed investigators he considered attacking Chauvin for a few month as a result of the previous officer, convicted of murdering George Floyd, is a high-profile inmate, prosecutors stated. Turscak later denied eager to kill Chauvin, prosecutors stated.
Turscak is accused of attacking Chauvin with an improvised knife within the jail’s legislation library round 12:30 p.m. on Nov. 24, the day after Thanksgiving. The Bureau of Prisons stated workers stopped the assault and carried out “life-saving measures.” Chauvin was taken to a hospital for remedy.
Turscak informed FBI brokers interviewing him after the assault that he attacked Chauvin on Black Friday as a symbolic connection to the Black Lives Matter motion, which garnered widespread assist within the wake of Floyd’s dying, and the “Black Hand” image related to the Mexican Mafia, prosecutors stated.
Turscak, 52, can be charged with assault with intent to commit homicide, assault with a harmful weapon, and assault leading to severe bodily damage. The tried homicide and assault with intent to commit homicide fees are every punishable by as much as 20 years in jail.
He’s scheduled to finish his present sentence in 2026.
A lawyer for Turscak was not listed in courtroom information. Turscak has represented himself from jail in quite a few courtroom issues. After the stabbing, he was moved to an adjoining federal penitentiary in Tucson, the place he remained in custody on Friday, inmate information present.
Messages searching for remark have been left with Chauvin’s attorneys.
Chauvin, 47, was despatched to FCI Tucson from a maximum-security Minnesota state jail in August 2022 to concurrently serve a 21-year federal sentence for violating Floyd’s civil rights and a 22½-year state sentence for second-degree homicide.
Chauvin’s lawyer on the time, Eric Nelson, had advocated for protecting him out of the overall inhabitants and away from different inmates, anticipating he could be a goal. In Minnesota, Chauvin was primarily saved in solitary confinement “largely for his personal safety,” Nelson wrote in courtroom papers final 12 months.
Floyd, who was Black, died on Could 25, 2020, after Chauvin, who’s white, pressed a knee on his neck for 9½ minutes on the road exterior a comfort retailer the place Floyd was suspected of attempting to go a counterfeit $20 invoice.
Bystander video captured Floyd’s fading cries of “I can not breathe.” His dying touched off protests worldwide, a few of which turned violent, and compelled a nationwide reckoning with police brutality and racism.
Turscak led a faction of the Mexican Mafia within the Los Angeles space within the late Nineteen Nineties, going by the nickname “Stranger,” in keeping with courtroom information. He grew to become an FBI informant in 1997, offering details about the gang and recordings of conversations he had with different Mexican Mafia members and associates.
The investigation led to greater than 40 indictments. However about halfway by, the FBI dropped Turscak as an informant as a result of he was nonetheless dealing medicine, extorting cash, and authorizing assaults. Based on courtroom papers, Turscak plotted assaults on rival gang members and was accused of making an attempt to kill a frontrunner of a rival Mexican Mafia faction whereas additionally being focused himself.
Turscak pleaded responsible in 2001 to racketeering and conspiring to kill a gang rival. He stated he thought his cooperation with the FBI would have earned a lighter sentence.
“I did not commit these crimes for kicks,” Turscak stated, in keeping with information experiences about his sentencing. “I did them as a result of I needed to if I needed to remain alive. I informed that to the FBI brokers they usually simply stated, ‘Do what it’s a must to do.”‘
