On Nov. 24 of this past year, one-time FBI informant John Turscak stabbed former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin 22 times at the FCI Tucson prison where both were housed. In their continued persecution of Chauvin, now 47, for his role in the death of George Floyd, prison officials have made Chauvin’s life even more miserable than it was prior to the stabbing. “It was like he was the perpetrator,” Chauvin’s mother, Caroline Pawlenty, told me.
While he recovers, Chauvin is locked away in a small windowless medical unit. The only real difference between his cell and a standard one is the steel procedural table in the middle with a rail on its side for easy handcuffing.