Talk:Trial of Derek Chauvin

Presumptive sentencing in lead

Should we include the presumptive sentence of 12.5 years in the lead? We would only need to do this until the sentencing hearing is concluded in 8–9 weeks, and the information is currently included in the body of the article. Virtually every RS appears to report on the 40 year maximum, and then very soon thereafter on the 12.5 year presumptive sentence. This is helpful, I think, to avoid creating the false impression of the likely penalty/range of penalties in this case, which seems important enough information for the lead too. Here is the sentence that I had originally added to the lead: ([1]).

Minnesota sentencing guidelines suggest a presumptive sentence of 12.5 years, discounting aggravating factors.

Alternatively, we could do a slim version of this (something like "the presumptive sentence under Minnesota law is much lower"), or just state that the sentencing hearing will begin in 8 weeks. — Goszei (talk) 07:13, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Comment. An evaluation of the "headline stories" and what they have to say. Many organizations later released smaller "sentencing analysis" articles. AP News only mentions 40 years. NYTimes mentions the 12.5 years. The Guardian mentions a shorter sentence. WaPo mentions 11 to 12 years. WSJ mentions 11 to 15 years. Reuters mentions the 12.5 years. BBC only mentions 40 years. CNN mentions 12.5 years. ABC mentions 12.5 years and speculates on 15. — Goszei (talk) 07:33, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

I'd leave it out of the lead, which should keep to simple facts not subject to dispute. Sentencing possbilities can be explained in the body.—Bagumba (talk) 09:32, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Per Bagumba, we really shouldn't put speculation in the lede. The lede is meant to be stable and summarise content. So add it to the body narrative and then we can refer to it in the lede as / when sentencing takes place. Koncorde (talk) 09:53, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Yes, leave it out of the lede. Anywikiuser (talk) 10:31, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

It`s spelled LEAD...leave it in...he will be out in 10-20 if that 2600:1702:2340:9470:E0AC:CD44:4802:427 (talk) 20:15, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Should this be placed? If so, where?

External videos
Pioneer Press Live Stream of Derek Chauvin trial on YouTube (1 hr 44 min 58 s)

It is from a known news organization and may be useful. aeschyIus (talk) 16:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Are you sure you have the right link? I see downtime. If that's the point, it works here and only here. InedibleHulk (talk) 02:02, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

At the endm it shows. aeschyIus (talk) 20:16, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Oh, OK, I see. Shows a masked man barely reacting to the verdict. Even if you'd trimmed the 99% of filler, I don't think it'd add much beyond "The defendant's eyes darted about". InedibleHulk (talk) 23:05, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 22 April 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. There is consensus to move to Trial of Derek Chauvin per WP:COMMONNAME. (closed by non-admin page mover) – Lord Bolingbroke (talk) 21:20, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

---

State v. Chauvin → Trial of Derek Chauvin – Per WP:COMMONNAME, "State v. Chauvin" only has around 100 hits while "Trial of Derek Chauvin" has ~1,000,000. Similar examples include Trial of George Zimmerman, Trial of Michael Jackson and Trial of Susan B. Anthony. Note: The last RM was closed with the suggestion that a new RM can be opened with a new alternative name. #Proposed name changes (above) suggests this title has support, so this formal RM is opened to minimize having to duplicate arguments. —Bagumba (talk) 08:09, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support For my reasons stated in #Proposed name changes. Phillip Samuel (talk) 08:24, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Same InedibleHulk (talk) 09:02, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Strongest possible oppose as this article is about the criminal case, not the trial. The case includes investigation, pretrial motion practice, the trial itself, posttrial motion practice, sentencing, and direct appeals. MOS:LAW governs here. This is an article about a case, not about a trial. The fact that a number of other articles we have are wrongly named is of no moment; WP:WAX. I implore those rushing to jump on this terrible name choice because they're being wowed by someone's claim of more WP:GHITS to actually make a policy-based argument. Just because this is a high-profile case does not require it to have different handling from other articles about legal cases. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 11:45, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
  • Point of order as well, Bagumba is misrepresenting the search engine results given above. The first, purportedly showing the number of Google News search hits for "Trial of Derek Chauvin" only returns 114 results, and not the one million-plus results falsely claimed. Assuming good faith, Bagumba has simply failed to perform a search engine test properly. This is clearly not a WP:COMMONNAME situation. But even if it were, the test is not what news sources—which use sensational, often incorrect terminology to refer to things—but what the common name is. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 11:48, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

    I see 1.9M when I click the link he provided which is a google news search for "Trial of Derek Chauvin" with quotes. Same search with quote for a general search I see 7.6M. WikiVirusC^(talk) 12:13, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

    You see a claimed estimate of each large round number, the actual numbers of results for each query are around a hundred (including mere duplicates). InedibleHulk (talk) 23:22, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

    It's rather ironic that you make accusations of my "misrepresenting" while claiming AGF. Regarding searching news sources, WP:COMMONNAME states: When using Google, generally a search of Google Books and News Archive should be defaulted to before a web search. Cheers. —Bagumba (talk) 13:36, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

    • You misrepresented the results. I didn't say you did it intentionally. I'm assuming it was mere negligence or ignorance of how to perform a search engine test. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 22:17, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

      My dictionary defines misrepresent as "to give a false or misleading representation of usually with an intent to deceive or be unfair".—Bagumba (talk) 20:39, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

      usually Thank you for confirming that I did not say you did it intentionally. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 08:01, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support for reasons given on previous two discussion, such as WP:COMMONNAME. WikiVirusC^(talk) 12:13, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support the common name in media reports. Few sources are using the technical legal name of the trial. (t · c) buidhe 12:28, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. The large disparity in the search results is a good enough factor. 400 vs. 1.9 million. Kellis7 12:54, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. In addition, wikipedia is written for the general reader, not the technical specialist, so an easily recognizable, widely used name is appropriate. --K.e.coffman (talk) 14:12, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. I'll be honest, I was a bit surprised to find that the article was listed under the current heading when I clicked on it from the front page. I think most users would expect to find this entry under the established "Trial of..." title structure. MykReeve T·C 15:47, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support obvious case of WP:COMMONNAME here. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 16:44, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose, as a sufficient case hasn't been made for this as the WP:COMMONNAME. As noted at WP:HITS and by the IP user above, Google's initial hits estimate is often wildly incorrect. By navigating to the last page of results, you can get a more accurate number.
  Last page of "Trial of Derek Chauvin" - about 116 results
  Last page of "Derek Chauvin trial" - about 147 results
  Last page of "State v. Chauvin" - about 71 results.
  Not enough of a difference between them to justify one common name. I am not persuaded about arguments based on consistency with other article titles; many of those, including Trial of George Zimmerman and Trial of Susan B. Anthony were named with little or no discussion. Our own Manual of Style is clear on a naming recommendation and we should follow it until an actual, clear common name is established. Firefangledfeathers (talk) 16:46, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

  I also commented below, but "State v. Chauvin" is closer to ~20 results if sites tricycle.org and defpen.com are excluded. "Trial of Derek Chauvin" and "Derek Chauvin trial" are more or less the same name and should be combined. —Bagumba (talk) 05:21, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Oppose per Firefangledfeathers. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 20:50, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:CRITERIA. Specifically, I believe the proposed name would meet the "recognizability", "naturalness", "conciseness", and "consistency" criteria. The "precision" criteria is not met, as Chauvin is currently facing tax evasion charges along with his ex-wife, so any of the options that are under consideration would be too ambiguous. However, I think this can be resolved by including a hatnote that links to the tax evasion trial, per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Edge3 (talk) 22:36, 22 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support as per others above Kauri0.o (talk) 00:14, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per others above. (Common Name, and what Bagumba has said in several locations) — Ched (talk) 01:01, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME Iamreallygoodatcheckers (talk) 02:16, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Comment I have opened a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Legal#Article titles for criminal cases to see if MOS:LAW could be revised to reflect the prevalence of other "Trial of..." articles on Wikipedia. Edge3 (talk) 02:47, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support "X v. Y" for cases important for their precedent, and "Trial of Y" for high-profile criminal cases is seemingly standard practice, and for good reason (recognizability and commonness, mostly). — Goszei (talk) 03:31, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support. As a practical matter, trial-level cases will rarely be important enough to report their legal significance in a Wikipedia article at all. The ones that are reported in this way, e.g., Miranda v. Arizona, are the Supreme Court decisions (or appellate court decisions) addressing narrow points of law and setting important precedents on how the law is to be applied. This trial, though historically consequential, has established no new law at all. It has only carried out existing law. The significance is in the trial, not the case. BD2412 T 03:51, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  Well, no, the significance is George Floyd's death. But because of the volume of coverage the case has received, we have a separate article. The appropriate point of demarcation between George Floyd's death and the prosecution of Derek Chauvin is, indeed, the case and not the trial. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 22:23, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Oppose per Firefangledfeathers and the opposing IP user. More time should pass before WP:COMMONNAME is argued, the WP:SET was performed inaccurately, and I do not find the existence of articles with similar naming conventions being of relevance to argue the move per WP:WAX. This may very well be necessary down the road, but not necessarily now. -Sirdog9002 (talk) 04:42, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  I do not find the existence of articles with similar naming conventions: This search shows precedents. It's not a hard and fast WP rule to use "Trial of", it's based on reliable source usage and WP:COMMONNAME.—Bagumba (talk) 05:14, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  Wait, part of that clause was covered by dust. It goes on: being of relevance to argue the move.... I can't make out the rest, seems like wax built up. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:42, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  Strike. Wax in my eyes.—Bagumba (talk) 07:53, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Comment It seems that "State v. Chauvin" hits are mostly from two sites: tricycle.org and defpen.com. Excluding those sites, it shows only 22 results.—Bagumba (talk) 05:08, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  That link shows me 24, but yeah, close enough to still be convincingly small. InedibleHulk (talk) 06:26, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  It fluctuates (for technical reasons beyond me), but it's more the rough number that's the point.—Bagumba (talk) 07:51, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  I tried searching for myself, without all that personalized cyberhooha, and still got 24. Let's go with 23. Everybody remembers that number! InedibleHulk (talk) 08:18, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  The point is irrelevant. MOS:LAW controls. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 22:24, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  And MOS:LAW says: However, criminal trials that are notable for the people or crimes involved, not for the legal precedent they set, should be titled "Trial of (defendant)" or another commonly recognizable name.—Bagumba (talk) 20:47, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

  ...which language was just added yesterday following no RfC and an extremely brief discussion almost exclusively attended by people from this article's discussion. Why are you citing it as though that's binding or longstanding? 69.174.144.79 (talk) 04:02, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

  You cited MOS:LAW at 22:24, 23 April 2021 (UTC). The verbiage was already there before you commented. You did not read it correctly. As for binding, WP:RULES says Wikipedia generally does not employ hard-and-fast rules ... Please tone down the rhetoric. And only you have mentioned anything about "longstanding".—Bagumba (talk) 05:39, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support - meets all of the criteria. It's obviously the WP:COMMONNAME, it's more natural to the non-expert reader, it's concise and unambiguous, and it's consistent with our usual practice for trials that are notable qua trials. (I also agree with BD2412's argument regarding significance.) Even for a formalist such as I, this is not a close call. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 06:00, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Weak support per COMMONNAME Anywikiuser (talk) 07:38, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Comment — and when this case is appealed (perhaps twice, once to the court of appeals and then to the supreme court) how will it be titled then? Or are we going to create yet another article (or two) dealing with this event? Kablammo (talk) 12:36, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  Depends on the notability of the appeals separate from the case, but appeals will be covered in this article as titled, and if it becomes necessary a split can happen if coverage is too much for just this one article. An appeal itself isn't a new trial, so a split title would be Appeal of W/E we decide. If the appeal is successful, it may not even happen but one of several options is to have a new trial, which then would probably be the focus of that same appeal article, which will then need to be renamed or discussed to split again. Regardless we can't predict the future, thinking about all that now doesn't really help. WikiVirusC^(talk) 12:46, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  Actually, there already has been an appeal for this case. See State v. Chauvin, an appellate opinion stating that precedential opinions of the Minnesota Court of Appeals are binding authority immediately upon filing. I agree that appellate opinions for the same case will warrant separate articles if their precedential value is separate from the significance of the trial itself. Edge3 (talk) 15:00, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  I was talking about an appeal of the verdict, which I believe the person I was responding to was as well. The 3rd degree murder appeal is covered in article already. WikiVirusC^(talk) 15:10, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

  It is highly unusual for Wikipedia to have more than a single article about a legal dispute despite multiple courts having handled them. And the trial has zero value as precedent: Trial courts don't make legal precedent. Generally speaking, articles about litigation focus on the highest published decision and largely ignore lower court proceedings. Cases like these are special because of how sensational the coverage is, but it is very unlikely that appeals will merit freestanding articles. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 22:20, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support - as per BD2412's comment above. Coffeespoons (talk) 13:11, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. Phoenix53004 (talk) 13:53, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support per WP:COMMONNAME, I have only ever heard it said this way.E0126E (talk) 14:54, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

• Oppose per Sirdog9002. Jarmihi_GOCE (talk) 15:33, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose - this article is about the murder and manslaughter case of Derek Chauvin (including indictment, pre-trial, trial, post-trial, appeals, etc.) and not just the murder and manslaughter trial of Chauvin. Also, Chauvin's next trial begins June 30, 2021, in his ongoing tax evasion case. Tvc 15 (talk) 18:21, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support. I don't know who would look for this article under the current title. The proposed change is clearly the common name. Additionally, although I'm not an expert in legal terminology, it seems to me that the article is about the trial. The content about everything that happened before and after the trial are contained in the Background and Reactions sections, which makes it clear that they are simply providing context for the core of the article, which is about the trial. Aerin17 (talk) 19:09, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose Anyone still waging around arguments based on numbers of Google hits should know that search engines are more intelligent than that. Tools like keywords and redirects help both bots and humans find articles. Born2bgratis (talk) 19:32, 23 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support Per WP:COMMONNAME. In its everyday usage, "trial" is broad enough to encompass the events the article covers.  White Whirlwind  05:55, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
  • This is the core problem: Improper usage being "common" is not an excuse for making this article inaccessible to people with an education in law. The current title is factually correct, accessible to lay readers (if not plainly then through redirects using {{R from incorrect name}} or {{R from related name}} or {{R from more specific name}}), maintains its accessibility to people who know better, and keeps Wikipedia's editors from looking like a bunch of dilettantes in yet another high-profile article. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 17:50, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

    Improper usage being "common" is not an excuse ...: WP:COMMONNAME, which is a policy, says: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources) as such names will usually best fit the five criteria listed above. {{R from technical name}} is available to redirect legalese terms.—Bagumba (talk) 02:53, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

    • I recommend using the "preview" function and reading what you're going to post before you post it, Bagumba. it generally prefers means that it's not necessarily the case, nor is it guaranteed. This is why we have specific article naming guidelines like MOS:LAW (which was suddenly changed after the opening of this discussion in order to make it seem as though the proposed title was mandated by the guideline). Actually read the policy and the guideline and don't try to selectively quote things thinking it's a "gotcha". It's not a useful or productive form of discussion. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 04:09, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

• Support. Natural English, and matches the scope of the article. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:44, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
  • It does not match the scope of the article. The scope is the case, not the trial. 69.174.144.79 (talk) 17:50, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
    • I saw that you said that, and gave it long consideration, but I don’t agree with you. Case and trial overlap, trial works fine, and case details not in the trial still fit as associated. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:03, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support Per WP:COMMONNAME Gandydancer (talk) 13:16, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
• Comment A few have brought up a future tax evasion trial. There's no guarantee that will be notable enough for a standalone article. If it is, we can deal with disambiguation at that time, if necessary, as we do with any other page. Not before.---- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bagumba (talk • contribs) 13:42, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose Chandan Kanti Paul (talk) 15:50, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per commonname and established precedent. JDDJS (talk to me • see what I've done) 18:36, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. Some1 (talk) 20:58, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. MBihun (talk) 15:01, 25 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. Hostagecat (talk) 05:22, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support Admanny (talk) 21:46, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. Combefere ❯❯❯ Talk 21:52, 27 April 2021 (UTC)
• Support for reasons that others have already given above. RisingStar (talk) 03:20, 28 April 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Keith Ellison as prosecutor

Isn't Keith Ellison supposed to be special prosecutor? The infobox doesn't have him listed. Phillip Samuel (talk) 15:24, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

As far as I could tell, he wasn't actually prosecuting the case during the day-to-day coverage. Edge3 (talk) 23:57, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

By all accounts, state Attorney General Ellison was the lead prosecutor, [2] which is also stated in the prose. Is it standard to only list those public facing in the infobox? No mention in the documentation.—Bagumba (talk) 03:15, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

Skrelk commented on this above, so they might know something about it. I assume it shouldn't be, but I don't really know either. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 15:05, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

Its unclear to what extent Keith Ellison is prosecuting the case. Its routine for the elected prosecutor to be an attorney of record, even if they aren't actually prosecuting the case. I dont know Wikipedia usually includes those as prosecutors or not, but it wouldn't make a ton of sense. I'm inclined to think that Ellison was just an attorney of record by virtue of being the AG, since looking at the publicly available pleadings, it doesn't look like he signed any. It would be surprising if he played an active role, since as a politician, he probably doesn't have much recent litigation experience Skrelk (talk) 16:38, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

He didn't participate in any of the in court roles but there have been coverage of his role in prosecuting the case. [3] While Mr. Ellison did not speak in court, he was there most days on the prosecution side of the room, .... He was deeply involved in just about every aspect of the case, from preparing witnesses to weighing in on jury selection, said Neal Katyal, a former acting solicitor general during the Obama administration who was part of the prosecution team. WikiVirusC^(talk) 19:12, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

He is also the one that gave the press conference speech following the verdict with the other attorneys all giving a shorter commentary. I'd add his name if I could figure out how to do it, but I can't... Gandydancer (talk) 08:56, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

I added his name in wikilink with "(lead)" on the side. Should it be (special) or (lead)? Phillip Samuel (talk) 17:25, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

I think lead as I'm not sure what special might mean. Gandydancer (talk) 18:48, 26 April 2021 (UTC)