The first booking photos of Derek Chauvin, the disgraced Minneapolis police officer sentenced to more than 22 years in prison for the fatal arrest of George Floyd, have emerged since he was placed behind bars last month.
The images of Chauvin were snapped just five days after Hennepin County Judge Peter Cahill sentenced the former cop to 22-and-a-half years at the Minnesota Correctional Facility at Oak Park Heights.
With good behavior, Chauvin could win supervised release for the final seven-and-a-half years of his sentence.
Chauvin has been at the facility - the only maximum security prison in the state - since he was convicted of second- and third-degree murder as well as second-degree manslaughter in April.
The first booking photos of Derek Chauvin, the disgraced Minneapolis police officer sentenced to more than 22 years in prison for the fatal arrest of George Floyd, have emerged since he was placed behind bars last month
The images of Chauvin were snapped just five days after Hennepin County Judge Peter Cahill sentenced the former cop to 22-and-a-half years at the Minnesota Correctional Facility at Oak Park Heights
Chauvin is incarcerated at Oak Park Heights, where he was held in the eight weeks preceding sentencing. The prison is the state's only maximum-security facility. It was built in 1982 and has a capacity for 473 male inmates
This photo shows a cell in the Administrative Control Unit at the Oak Park Heights facility. This cell is similar to the one that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin has been in since he was found guilty in April
Minnesota prison officials said that while it was unusual to hold a convict at a maximum security prison before they are due to begin their sentence, it was done in Chauvin’s case for his own protection.
Typically after a convict is sentenced in Minnesota, they are brought to a lower-security facility, the Minnesota Correctional Facility at St. Cloud, for booking and processing.
From there, the inmates are then sent to a more permanent prison assignment.
The Department of Corrections, however, decided to keep Chauvin in his cell at Oak Park Heights for his own protection.
Chauvin remains isolated at the prison, away from the general population inmates.
Chauvin, seen in a gray suit, gray tie and sporting a buzz cut walk out of the Minnesota court room moments after being sentenced to 22.5 years in prison last month
'He was at Oak Park Heights for his safety pre-sentencing,' a state DOC spokesperson told Insider.
'Since he was already at Oak Park Heights and was going to stay there, it would have not made sense to bring him up to St. Cloud.'
Most state prisons have a unit to separate inmates from the general population for safety or security.
But Oak Park Heights has what the DOC calls Minnesota’s ‘most secure’ unit to separate individuals from others in the prison for disciplinary or security reasons.
Photos provided by the state show an empty cell in that unit has white cinderblock walls, slim rectangular windows, a metal toilet and sink and a thin mattress on a fixed bed frame.
Chauvin has been kept there for security since his conviction, alone in a 10 foot-by-10 foot cell that is monitored by corrections staff via camera and in-person checks.
He has meals brought to his room and is allowed out for
