- Chauvin’s attacker, John Turscak, was charged with attempted murder
Derek Chauvin, the police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd, was stabbed 22 times with an “improvised knife” in a horror prison knife attack last week, it has emerged.
The attacker, identified as John Turscak, was charged with attempted murder and allegedly told officers he would have killed the disgraced former police officer if they had not responded quickly, prosecutors said.
Chauvin was attacked in the law library at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson, Arizona, with Turscak telling FBI agents that he had been planning the attack for about a month.
The inmate also said he chose Black Friday as the date of his attack because of its symbolic connection to the Black Lives Matter movement, which sparked nationwide protests in the summer of 2020.
It is unclear what Turscak was in prison for at the time.
Chauvin was stabbed 22 times in a horror attack on a prison last Friday
The disgraced former police officer was assaulted at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson, Arizona (pictured), where he was transferred in August 2022
Turscak also said he chose the day after Thanksgiving to attack in connection with the “Black Hand” symbol, which is associated with the Mexican Mafia gang, prosecutors said.
He remains in custody and does not have an attorney listed in court records. He has already represented himself in numerous court proceedings.
Chauvin is serving 21 years in prison for violating Floyd’s civil rights and was originally housed in a maximum security prison in Minnesota before being transferred to FCI Tuscon in Arizona in August 2022.
He is also serving a concurrent 22.5-year sentence for second-degree murder. He was convicted of killing Floyd in May 2022 after pressing his knee on Floyd’s neck for over nine minutes.
The former police officer’s attorney, Eric Nelson, has previously advocated for keeping his client out of the general prison population because of the high profile of his crime.
As an expected target, Chauvin was kept in solitary confinement largely for his own protection, Nelson said last year.