Former officers involved in George Floyd's death due to appear in court
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George Floyd’s uncle vowed on Monday to urge his small town of Gettysburg, S.D., to remove the Confederate flag from its police department’s insignia.
Selwyn Jones, 54, whose late sister is Floyd’s mother, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he would attend a Gettysburg City Council meeting next week when leadership in the town of under 1,200 people will discuss the police logo.
Mayor Bill Wuttke told the Star Tribune Tuesday that the Gettysburg Police Department was “working on something different” for the logo, but blamed out-of-towners and the liberal media for pressure to remove the flag.
Gettysburg South Dakota Police Department insignia since 2009.
“We’re not wanting the liberals and the press telling us we have to change it," Wuttke said. "People here do not feel it’s racism. It’s so ridiculous. Ninety-nine percent of the people don’t have any idea. It’s just something that’s there. I’ve had more local people in favor of it than against it.”
Jones said he spoke with Wuttke in early June to tell him Confederate flags on the town's police uniforms have "got to go."
“I know my neighbors will listen in order to understand the history of hurt that African-Americans and other people of color have experienced,” Jones wrote in a Facebook post after his conversation with the mayor. “I am also sure that the flag issue in Gettysburg will be resolved because the killing of my nephew George Floyd is offensive to all lovers of freedom.”
The logo displays equally sized American and Confederate flags, with a cannon below. The design as it stands has been on Gettysburg police vehicles, uniforms and other department property since 2009, the Star Tribune reported.
It was removed as the department's Facebook profile picture on June 12 and replaced with a new image that reads “Enough Is Enough” over a black background with a blue stripe.
“Enough is enough. Violence needs to end,” Gettysburg Police Chief Dave Mogard wrote, referencing the change in the department's profile picture. “It’s not meant towards anybody personally.”
“It’s only racist to those that make it racist,” Mogard wrote in a second post that has since been deleted, according to the Rapid City Journal. That caption was attached to an image of an undated newspaper clip attempting to explain the meaning of the Confederate flag.
“The red represents the blood of Christ. The blue “X” represents the Christian cross of Saint Andrews, the first disciple of Jesus Christ and patron Saint of Scotland. The 13 stars represent the 13 Southern states of the secession,” the photo of the clipping read, according to a screenshot of the entire post provided to the Journal.
Jones spoke to the newspaper in a phone interview while driving back from Minneapolis to the South Dakota town he’s lived in for three years. He had just attended a hearing for the four fired Minneapolis police officers charged in George Floyd’s May 25 death.
Derek Chauvin, 44, was arrested on May 29, four days after he was caught on camera pinning his knee into the back of Floyd's neck for nearly nine minutes while the handcuffed black man struggled for air and begged for his life. Chauvin and the three other officers at the scene have been charged in Floyd's death.
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Since Floyd’s death, protesters have called for a national reckoning on racial injustice and police brutality, with Black Lives Matter advocating to defund police departments and establish new public safety models. Demonstrators have also vandalized or torn down Confederate monuments – or even statues of other historic officials.
Fox News' Barnini Chakraborty contributed to this report.
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