Sharon Fairley Talks to CBS about Chauvin Verdict

Law Professor Sharon Fairley: Derek Chauvin Verdict In George Floyd’s Death Will Be ‘Defining Moment’ For Many Young People, Sends Message About What’s Possible In Chicago

A local expert on Tuesday said the conviction of fired Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd will be a defining moment for many young people seeking change, and will serve also as a lesson in Chicago that such convictions are possible.

Sharon Fairley is now a professor from practice at the University of Chicago Law School. Previously, she oversaw the Independent Police Review Authority in Chicago, which has since been supplanted by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability.

Fairley joined CBS 2’s Brad Edwards and Irika Sargent to talk about the historic verdict on Thursday. Edwards began by asking Fairley if the Chauvin verdict amounted to a potential pivot point for people who are calling for change at police departments and policing practices across the country.

“Absolutely it is. This is going to be a defining moment for many young people, and of course, young Black people,” Fairley said. “This conviction is historic for a number of reasons. It starts with what happened last year – that the idea, the outrage from last year actually got turned into and focused into reform, and so we’ve seen a number of really important historic police reform measures being passed at the state level, for example, in the last year. We see many cities, large and small, beefing up their accountability systems. And so this incident and the aftermath has really, really put the wind in the sails of activists, who have really taken the activism and made it work for positive change.”

Read more at CBS Chicago

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