Alpha News, a Minnesota-based new organization, has released an eye-opening documentary called The Fall of Minneapolis.
The documentary undertakes a comprehensive deconstruction of the narrative surrounding the death of George Floyd, beginning with the events surrounding Floyd’s actual arrest and ending with the aftermath of the trial of Derek Chauvin.
The Fall of Minneapolis argues that politically-influenced, poor decision-making by local leadership, coupled with biased mainstream media fueled the riotous conflagration that swept through Minneapolis and across the country during the summer of 2020 and led to four Minneapolis Police officers being convicted in trials which were tainted by that same political context.
'The Fall of Minneapolis' is a groundbreaking work in various ways, in part because of the significant involvement of those at the center of the Floyd controversy. Producer Liz Collin, an Emmy Award-winning reporter and author who formerly worked for local CBS affiliate WCCO. Collin was placed at the center of the controversy when her husband, Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis President Bob Kroll was targeted with calls for resignation during the Floyd riots. Protestors went so far as to protest outside Collin’s home and destroy pinata effigies of her and her husband. Collin has subsequently dedicated much of her reporting efforts to dissecting and exposing the hidden realities underlying the George Floyd controversy.
The documentary also gives voice to the men and women of the Minneapolis Police Department. 'The Fall of Minneapolis' features the testimonies of Minneapolis police officers who were at the center of the riots and were among those evacuated during the abandonment of the Third Police Precinct.
The documentary features the very first interviews with Officers Derek Chauvin and Alex Kueng, two of the four officers involved in Goerge Floyd’s arrest. These interviews paint a picture of the events in the summer of 2020 that starkly differs from the larger media narrative.
The documentary seeks to dismantle the media myths surrounding the Floyd case, first and foremost it argues that George Floyd was murdered under the knee of Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin.
The documentary presents the evidence that Floyd died of a drug overdose. Body cam footage featured in the documentary reveals an erratic and uncooperative Floyd with one or more pills in his mouth complaining “I can’t breathe"- before even being restrained on the ground at his request. Floyd’s autopsy revealed that he had no external injuries to his neck, and, in addition to underlying conditions like coronary artery disease, had lethal quantities of Fentanyl in his system as well as methamphetamine.
The subsequent autopsy review requested by Floyd’s family was revealed to have never included a physical autopsy, nor an examination of photos and the toxicology report from the autopsy conducted by the state.
The documentary also highlights the narrative spun by the media and how it arguably compromised the trials of the four officers, Derek Chauvin’s in particular. While the media repeatedly highlighted the length of time which Floyd was restrained, they failed to note that the officers had called EMS only 36 seconds after Floyd was laid on the ground.
Other notable occurrences include Judge Peter Cahill’s refusal to allow exculpatory evidence into the the record, including body camera footage showing Office Thomas Lane administering CPR to Floyd in an ambulance and Minneapolis Police Department training manuals and powerpoints which included the Maximum Restraint Technique used by the officers during Floyd’s arrest.
Perhaps the most shocking allegation highlighted in the documentary is the dereliction of duty on the part of officials in Minnesota and Minneapolis. Foremost among these, 'The Fall of Minneapolis' makes the allegation that Chief Medaria Arradondo lied on the stand and claimed that the restraint used by Chauvin and his fellow officers was not a part of Minneapolis Police Department training.
The documentary notes this runs in direct contradiction to both the published training materials and the plethora of Minneapolis Police officers interviewed, all of whom confirmed that they had been trained to utilize the Maximum Restraint Technique. The movie also reveals how Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Minneapolis Police Department leadership forced the abandonment of the Third Precinct while keeping the officers at the precinct in the dark about the decision until the last minute, forcing many of them to run a gauntlet of hostile protesters armed with rocks, frozen water bottles, and molotov cocktails.
'The Fall of Minneapolis' presents a stunning picture of media bias, faulty decisions, and a trial marred by a fallacious narrative. Yet, even those at the center of this catastrophe hope that lessons can be learned. Officer Alex Kueng, the black officer who performed the initial arrest of George Floyd on that fateful day and was sentenced to three and a half years in prison, declared “I just hope that at the very least people in the future can keep an open mind and not let instances like this happen. Just use my case as an example to not jump the gun, not knee jerk, not fall to this race bait, to the social media, to the media, and let them get away with what they do. Because of things like this keep happening no one anywhere is going to have any sense of justice left.”
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