MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin is set to trade solitary confinement in Minnesota’s only maximum-security prison for an unknown future in a federal prison where, despite his national notoriety for the killing of George Floyd, he will likely be more safe.
Chauvin will be sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court in St. Paul after pleading guilty in December to federal civil rights charges.  He is already serving 22 1/2 years for his conviction in state court on charges of murder and manslaughter.  His plea deal on the federal charges calls for a sentence of 20 to 25 years in prison and the sentences to be served concurrently in federal prison.
Inmates are eligible for parole earlier in Minnesota’s prison system than in the federal system, so the deal means Chauvin will spend at least a few more years behind bars than he would for the felony conviction alone. murder in the state.  But it avoids the life sentence he faced on the federal charges and allows him a safer environment with a little more freedom.
Chauvin, who is white, killed Floyd by pinning the unarmed Black man to the sidewalk with his knee for 9 1/2 minutes, despite the black man’s faint pleas of “I can’t breathe.”  Floyd’s killing in May 2020 sparked protests around the world and forced a national reckoning on police brutality and racism.
WHERE IS HE NOW?
For his own safety, Chauvin, 46, has been held since his conviction in “administrative segregation” at the state’s maximum-security prison in Oak Park Heights.  He has been largely confined to a 10-by-10-foot room, which he is allowed to set aside an average of an hour a day for exercise.
His attorney, Eric Nelson, wrote in a request for a 20-year sentence late last month that Chauvin “spent much of his time in solitary confinement, primarily for his own protection.”
Nelson speculated that Chauvin may never be placed in the general population of a prison because of the risks of being targeted because of the former officer and the “intense publicity surrounding his case.”  But outside experts say he will likely mix with other inmates at some point.
THE FEDERAL SYSTEM
The Bureau of Prisons determines where to send federal prisoners.  Judges can make recommendations.  But the decision on an inmate’s final placement and the appropriate level of security rests with the bureau, which manages prisons across the country, from low-security camps to a “supermax” for the most dangerous offenders.
Bureau spokesman Scott Taylor declined to comment specifically on Chauvin’s case.  But he said “a number of factors” influence placement decisions.
“Some of the factors include the level of security and supervision the inmate requires, any medical or scheduling needs, segregation and security measures to ensure the inmate’s protection and other considerations, including proximity to a person’s release residence,” said Taylor.
Nelson wrote that Chauvin “has been preliminarily diagnosed with heart damage and therefore, like many former law enforcement officers, is at greater risk of dying at a young age.”
But that’s just one factor the office could consider.  Another is the length of his sentence.  Experts speculate that it is likely to start in at least one medium security facility.
“I’ve been in a lot of federal prisons, including prison camps, and they’re not country clubs,” said Mark Osler, a professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law.  “But I would consider it unlikely that he would initially be incarcerated in a camp or a ‘low’ category prison. It is much more likely that he would end up in a ‘high’ or ‘medium’ classification.”
SECURITY ISSUES
If Chauvin were in the general population of a Minnesota state prison, he would be at risk of encountering inmates he had arrested or investigated when he was a Minneapolis officer, said Rachel Moran, another law professor at St.  Thomas.  While he can’t entirely escape his reputation in a federal prison elsewhere, he said, he’s unlikely to encounter inmates with such immediate, personal grudges.
“It’s dangerous to be an officer in any prison,” said former U.S. Attorney Tom Heffelfinger.  “It’s even more dangerous in state prisons because of the nature of the inmate population.  There are gangs, for example.  And the cops just don’t do well there.  Those risks are reduced in a federal prison.”
The state prison population is burdened by violent offenders, including people convicted of murder, robbery and rape, Heffelfinger said.  Federal prisons also hold inmates with violent backgrounds, he added, but are more likely to house nonviolent drug dealers, white-collar criminals and the like.
Assuming the office decides Chauvin is safe enough to be in the general population, he will have a better chance of moving, working and participating in programming.  These opportunities will vary by security level and individual facilities.
POSSIBLE PRECEDENT?
Former South Carolina police officer Michael Slager is serving a 20-year prison sentence for killing Walter Scott, an unarmed black man who ran away from a traffic stop.  Slager, who is white, pleaded guilty to a federal civil rights charge for shooting Scott in the back five times in 2015 after stopping him for a broken brake light in an incident that, like Floyd’s death, was recorded in videos that were widely viewed by viewers.
Slager’s state murder charge was dismissed as part of the federal plea deal.  His attorneys said at the time that Slager wanted to be in federal custody where he felt he would be safer than in state prison.  Slager is serving time in a low-security federal prison in Colorado.