People have been asking what 3rd degree murder means (what the offer was charged with) and the different legal standards around some of this stuff in the case around the killing of #GeorgeFloyd. A thread:

In criminal law there are two elements to a crime mens rea and actis rea.

So that’s the mental state and the act.

Different degrees of murder have different mental states and slightly different definitions of the act.

3rd degree murder is no intent to kill but someone dies anyway due to depraved or reckless behavior. Carries up to 25 years.

You may be wondering how this can be if you saw the video.

For police, they have qualified immunity, which means they’re immune from things that would normally be considered crimes if they do them as part of their job. For example, they kill someone who might be about to kill a child.

For police, the standard is not what it is for any other citizen to charge them with murder.

It has to be beyond what is “objectively reasonable” for another police officer to do in a similar situation.

This always makes the mens rea hard to prove for police officers.