Ex-Minneapolis police officer convicted in connection with George Floyd's killing released from federal prison

Thomas Lane, one of the four former Minneapolis police officers convicted in connection with the killing of George Floyd, has been released from federal prison. He was released on Tuesday, August 21.

Lane, 41, was found guilty in 2022 of violating Floyd's civil rights when he was fatally restrained by officers on May 25, 2020. Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, was handcuffed and restrained while lying on his stomach for more than nine minutes, even as he told the officers "I can't breathe."

The police officer held down Floyd's legs during the arrest, while his colleague Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into Floyd's neck and back, and another officer, J. Alexander Kueng, restrained Floyd's torso. The fourth officer, Tou Thao, stood nearby and kept back a crowd of upset bystanders.

Lane was sentenced to two and a half years in federal prison in July 2022.

Later that year, he was sentenced to three years in prison for a separate state charge of aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter in Floyd's death to which he pleaded guilty.

Lane had initially faced a charge of aiding and abetting second-degree unintentional murder, which prosecutors agreed to dismiss as part of a plea agreement, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison's office said at the time.

Lane's sentences were served concurrently at the Englewood prison in Colorado, a low-security federal correctional facility outside Denver that houses roughly 1,000 inmates, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

"He has a two-year term of supervision imposed through the District of Minnesota," Randilee Giamusso, a spokesperson for the Federal Bureau of Prisons, told CNN in an email Tuesday.

All four of the former Minneapolis police officers were convicted on state and federal charges in connection with Floyd's death.

Chauvin was found guilty in April 2021 of state charges of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter and sentenced to 22 and a half years in prison. The US Supreme Court rejected Chauvin's appeal of that conviction in November 2023.

Chauvin later pleaded guilty to federal charges of violating Floyd's civil rights and was sentenced to 21 years in prison to run concurrently with his state sentence.