ER doctor who treated George Floyd testifies on cause of death

The Hennepin County Medical Center doctor who treated Floyd and declared him dead last May testified that he believed Floyd likely died of asphyxia.
Dr. Bradford Langenfeld, an emergency medicine physician, said he treated Floyd for about 30 minutes on May 25, 2020, as hospital staff unsuccessfully tried to restart his heart. Based on what paramedics reported and on Floyd's medical condition, Langenfeld said the "more likely possibility" of Floyd's cardiac arrest was hypoxia, or lack of oxygen.
"Doctor, is there another name for death by oxygen deficiency?" prosecuting attorney Jerry Blackwell asked.
"Asphyxia is a commonly understood term," Langenfeld responded.
On cross-examination, Langenfeld said that hypoxia can be caused by many things, including drugs such as fentanyl, methamphetamine or a combination of both.
Earlier Monday, Judge Peter Cahill spoke to jurors outside of the view of cameras about an allegation of juror misconduct. He ruled there was not been any misconduct and the jurors were credible.

#ChauvinTrial #CNN #News

89 comments

  1. Regardless of whether it was drugs or a knee to the neck, at some point, Mr. Floyd was no longer resisting and should have received first aid. Instead, he was continued to be restrained and compressed.

    1. @Karen Fitzpatrick
      Also no accident that a guy that was told to get in the back seat didn’t.

    2. @Mo Elm You ask a large-scale question, I hope you don’t expect a simple answer? I would strongly suspect there are a few variables here, not just one like “more funding = more deaths”, because less funding also = more deaths if imagine.

      So what’s the common theme here? More deaths. What else is true thats changed since the 60s? Well, for starters the population has grown immensely. There are a LOT more people. Ontop of this, drug use has sky-rocketed. Gang membership has increased. Violent crime is on the rise and so is poverty, mostly in places effected by drugs and violent gangs.

      Whats your plan? What is your solution? The police are a dam holding back a very large wave of violence. The horror stories you read about police abuse are tragic, terrible, and largely avoidable. But they are the tip of a very very large ice-burg in a world without any police authorities. We would end up with the wild-wild west in America if you made it a free for all.

      It would be like “The Purge” movie. People would be eating each other. Not just in the states but in Europe too I imagine.

    3. @Brad Cozine
      why did he get pulled ? Let me guess … because he’s black and they wanted to make sure he was punished
      Look you’re dealing with a guy that has had 8 different convictions and been in jail for 4 years. He was a bouncer on the side. You mean to tell me a supposed bouncer couldn’t take a knee like that? I bet I could… oh wait I don’t commit crimes nevermind

  2. The doctor in this clip just looks so dead, like he’s had to explain what he’s said to way too many people and he’s just traumatised at this point

    1. Unfortunately most ER Doctors look this tired. The medical fields in general are extremely draining….especially this past year. I look this tired myself. 12 to 16 hour shifts six or seven days a week does this to people. I haven’t had a day off in 32 days!

    2. @J Knight if you resist then there are other ways of restraint other than kneeling on him for nine minutes at least once he stopped moving and was unconscious get off of him. It’s definitely murder.

    1. @Boobalopbop Have you thought about how the officers every time they have met him at his job have probably come up with various kinds of hints, allusions and probably things that are worse to get him to testify in a way who helped their colleague, so he has certainly had a hard year, but he stood his ground and told the truth

    2. @Boobalopbop that yes all IR doctors have had some hard years but this doctor has had an extra hard year due to how the police usually behave if a colleague is in trouble and an IR doctor witness statement can make or break a case against those colleagues, so due to the behavior of the police I think he has had a harder year than most IR doctors

  3. I wonder if the defense attorney would volunteer to allow the doctor to place his knee on the defense attorney’s neck for 9.5 minutes and then tell us if fentanyl could be to blame for his inability to breathe…

    1. and if not, he couldve died from the blood rush of the fentanyl and his adrenaline and boom cardiac arrest

    2. would you agree to take 4 times the lethal amount of a drug Fentanyl that kills through making the person unable to breathe to show to the court there is no problem there? Oh and a hefty dose of meth with it?

    3. @Stella Lewis they found pills in the car that had his saliva on them. He could’ve downed quite a few at the time of arrest which could cause breathing difficulty. There is so much unknown in this case but the video is damning for this Officer. I’m not condoning at all what happened to Mr. Floyd, just trying to educate that had he taken a large dose right before arrest it could absolutely cause him to quit breathing. Hope that makes sense? I will never forget seeing this video last year and crying all day after. I hope to never see another video like this again. I pray that justice is done.

  4. Dude looks exhausted. These doctors deserve all the respect for what they’ve done this year. They’ve been amazing.

    1. @Heidi Hoe just like how causing billions of dollars in damages, dozens of people dead, hundreds loosing businesses is an exaggeration. But acting like its the end of the world because of a one day protest outside the capitol is not? Use reasoning.

    2. @Thomas Weir Injecting yourself with chemicals and ingesting addictive, mind altering, medicines to cure minor illnesses seems like idiocy to me.

    3. @Professional Welfare Recipient I see you’re part of the long tradition of American Anti-intellectualism that has been prevalent since the puritans made landfall. Enjoy the momentary sense of agency that your rejection of science and reason gives you! You know that conspiracy theories won’t save you in the long term right? That’s the problem with all Luddites. They hate the technology that their brains can’t compute but love using it. All day. Every day. And when they need it most they’re the quickest of all to put aside their beliefs, for a moment, before returning to their ignorance.

    4. @alain charnier This trial isn’t about insurance cost and property loss and the doctor isn’t testifying about those issues.

  5. This doctor just looks so sad that every first responder failed to do their job and he was left with the aftermath of trying to save someone who was too far gone. ☹️

    1. I love how it’s so different until the JUNKIE is YOUR childhood friend or family member 🧠☠️

  6. The doc looks like he just gave up on life and he just lost everything hopefully everything is alright wit him

    1. @Horrace Corke far older, worldwide. Inquisition, Dark Ages, Crusades, Witch trials, it just keeps coming, pick up a history book.

    2. @Horrace Corke I mean killing anyone in the name of cloud people is really just insane, or gullible.

    3. @toohightohigh
      Yeah they are doing pretty good but I’m not talking about Africans im talking about black Americans, I’m not even related to Africans, I’m not African I’m black American just like how white people aren’t European they are white American.

    4. @Horrace Corke I reckon its too convenient that the guy overdosed on Fentanyl at the time he was arrested, handcuffed, put into the Police vehicle, then taken out of the vehicle postrated on the ground with three coppers on top of him, one with a knee on his neck & back. Didn’t GF get his addiction habit after using prescription drugs for back pain. If he was a regular user he wouldn’t just OD & besides he was coherent enough to say, “Officer I can’t breath”.

    5. @Google User 2000 I’d like to hear you saying the same comments if it were your brother, father, son who died unecessarily under these circumstances.

  7. even if it had been drugs giving george the sensation of sob, he should’ve been given medical attention for it regardless

    1. Not really possible to do that when an ambulance refuses to come to the seen because of the dangerous crowd.

    2. Also sure if he would of said hey i just chewed up a bunch of pills to hide them from you they would of known he was in the process of OD but instead he didn’t and they just assumed he was trying to resist to avoid jail.

  8. How is it when police kill someone they can bring up his whole criminal history going all the way back to middle school but a police prior disciplinary history at the department can’t come up unless he takes the stand ? That’s crazy!!!!

  9. This is because truth makes a coward of us all, we do this because we are ashamed of our actions and through a narracistic way try to explain it away.

    1. @William Winn they’re saying “we made those peaceful protestors look a lot less peaceful” and high fiving each other while watching tucker Carlson interview Matt gaetz…

    1. @PurpLeKitteNz619 we are both fortunate that we don’t have to face vile criminals every day as part of our daily job — and the murderous intentions they have towards law enforcement. If Mr Floyd was not engaging in despicable criminality that day — Mr Chauvin would in all liklihood be continuing his career and protecting us from disgusting criminals. He made a mistake but he had no intent to harm — only to protect himself from a deadly virus.

    2. @JP Morgan dude. This cop would have killed someone else if it wasnt floyd. It had nothing to do with a virus. How would the cop even know floyd had covid?

  10. He was already dead by the time he got to the hospital so it’s not really the ER doctor that they should be asking for cause of death it’s the medical examiner. I just can’t believe they didn’t give him CPR at the scene. Chauvin actually stopped him from getting CPR

    1. @Braveheart He was totally fine before the 9 minutes of pressure. If it was the drugs then he would’ve overdosed before the cops came. I just hope you or someone in your family go through this. Then maybe you might care for a human life. There are mass murderers who get better treatment but go off on the guy who was doing drugs for himself.

    2. @Marcus Rougeau he was having trouble breathing before he was taken to the ground. He repeated it several times before he was even in handcuffs. He had so many comorbidities and the Officer’s actions didn’t help. So many things went bad and sadly, someone who could have and should have been saved was killed. It’s disgusting and justice must prevail.

    3. @Laurie Reha why do you think they didn’t check? There was a off duty fire fighter in the scene begging to check his pulse and do cpr and the response was if your a real firefight you would know to not get involved. And a officer knows these things

    4. @Rienna Bennett I’m aware of the off duty EMT. Again, I thought they meant he didn’t allow officers to check. I saw the video. I’m well aware of what happened. Thanks though.

    5. @Marcus Rougeau because he ate the drugs when the cops showed up so he wouldn’t get caught with them

  11. This dr survived the george floyd trauma and covid trauma all at once and still stands. Thank men and women like this dr. And the paremedics and bystanders who all valued human life.

    1. @Noon Slayer2000 How do I know what?

      The OP is sarcasm. My second statement was from looking at the hospitalization rate as reprted by the CDC for covid over the course of a year.

    2. @Noon Slayer2000 Hard to know what you mean because you don’t qualify your response. Compared to what? Which country? The entire world population? What are you talking about?

      You mean they are lower than during the winter, during a huge peak. Back down to about the same place as the fall last year.

  12. As a corrections officer, one of the first things you learn in pre-service use of force classes is that the neck and head are never to be manipulated while in the prone position. Youre also taught to not leave anyone in prone position for more than a minute or so bc of the difficulty it can cause for breathing.

    1. A tragic accident?!?? That Chauvin coldly carried out over 9 minutes of people screaming that George Floyd was dying?? When it’s an accident, the paramedics don’t have to PULL CHAUVIN OFF OF GEORGE FLOYD!!! This was no accident and it’s disgusting to call it one or feel any sympathy toward Chauvin. May he be miserable for the rest of his miserable life!

    2. Floyd was a big dude and he was resisting arrest. I can see you getting fired one day for being a weakling

    3. True cause I can’t even sleep on my stomach without major discomfort can’t imagine being cuffed with a body on my back and knee on the neck head and body being smashed into the hard pavement. I’m sure this doctor loss sleep staying up trying to prepare his statement and not say the wrong thing.

    1. Think of this as how they protect the truth and ensure a valid outcome. If you were on trial you would want the same. Don’t get me wrong, I want to see him spend the rest of his life in prison, I do not want to see this trial appealed or the jury split… the process has to be protected even at the expense of the witnesses feelings.

  13. This reminds me more of the Superbowl. Whenever there’s a halt in play there will be a panel of people analysing what just happened.

  14. He was on the ground in cuffs where tf did they think he was gonna go?!!! He was already gone way before this doctor had time to see him.

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