Former Minneapolis officer Thomas Lane pleads guilty to manslaughter in George Floyd's death

A former Minneapolis police officer has pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter in the death of George Floyd, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison announced Wednesday. Thomas Lane will receive a three-year sentence, which will be served in a federal institution, according to his attorney.

Lane was one of four former Minneapolis police officers involved in the fatal May 2020 arrest that ended in the Floyd's death. Derek Chauvin, the former officer who knelt on Floyd's neck for over nine minutes, was sentenced to 22 and 1/2 years for Floyd's murder. Lane and former officers Tou Thao and J. Alexander Kueng were found guilty of depriving Floyd of his right to medical care in a federal trial earlier this year.

If Lane had been convicted of unintentional murder, he would have faced the state's mandatory minimum sentence of 12 years in prison. According to Lane's attorney Earl Gray, the former officer has a newborn child and he did not want to risk "not being part of the child's life." Lane's manslaughter sentence will be served concurrently with his federal sentence, and he's expected to be released in two years, Gray said.