Woman Who Claimed Derek Chauvin Knelt on Her Back Gets $600,000 Settlement: 'Serial Predator'

Mar. 15, 2025

The City of Minneapolis will pay $600,000 to a woman who says former police officer Derek Chauvin knelt upon her back, just months before doing a similar move that killed George Floyd in 2020.

The Minneapolis City Council unanimously approved paying out the settlement last week to Patty Day, who said in a federal lawsuit last year that Chauvin had violently ripped her out of her car on suspicion of drunk driving, handcuffed her and pressed his knee into her back.

The settlement is the latest of several instances in which Minneapolis has paid out money to resolve claims of police brutality against Chauvin, who is currently serving a 22-year prison sentence for murdering Floyd.

Daytold theMinnesotaStarTribunelast year that she had been drinking on the day in question in January 2020 and jumped in her van to pick up her child, but quickly pulled over after realizing how intoxicated she was.

She sat with the engine running for several hours untilneighbors later called the police, and Chauvin and another officer showed up, per the complaint.

Day told the newspaper that Chauvin and the other officer grabbed her out of the car and threw her face-down into the snowy street, fracturing her tooth and injuring her arm before slapping handcuffs on her.

In her complaint, she then said that Chauvin pressed his knee into her back even as she was “subdued and handcuffed.”

The complaint described the kneeling pose as Chauvin’s “calling card,” referring to the officeras a “serial predator.”

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“The look in his eye was so evil. I feared for my life. I didn’t know if I was going to survive this. It all escalated so quickly,” Day told theStar Tribune.

The charges against Day were dismissed more than a year later, after a judge ruled cops hadn’t had probable cause to arrest her, per the complaint.

Four months after the incident, Chauvin would come to international infamy after detaining Floyd on a Minneapolis street and pressing his knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes even as Floyd said he couldn’t breathe.

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source: people.com