The federal judge who sentenced Thomas Lane to 2 1/2 years in prison Thursday on a civil rights conviction in George Floyd's killing said the former Minneapolis police officer won’t have to surrender until after his sentencing in a separate state case in two months.
And legal experts said that's not unusual, even in a case as emotionally charged as Floyd's death under the knee of former Officer Derek Chauvin on May 25, 2020, which sparked protests in Minneapolis and around the world in a reckoning over racial injustice and policing. Even the federal prosecutors who handled Lane's case have said he was the least culpable of the four officers involved in Floyd's death.
