On Friday, charges were filed revealing John Turscak as the inmate accused of stabbing former police officer Derek Chauvin. Turscak, 52, has been charged with attempted murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, assault to commit murder and assault resulting in serious bodily injury.
The attempted murder and assault with intent to commit murder charges are individually punishable by a maximum of 20 years in prison.
Documents claim Turscak stabbed Chauvin with an “improvised knife” on Nov. 26 at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson, Ariz. Turscak said in an interview with FBI agents that he contemplated stabbing Chauvin due to his visibility.
Correctional officers reportedly used pepper spray on Turscak before employing “life-saving measures” on Chauvin, prosecutors stated. After the attack, he was hospitalized but was reported to be in stable condition as of Saturday.
Currently, Turscak is serving a 30-year prison sentence for crimes committed while working as a federal informant. Per court records, Turscak led a faction of the Mexican Mafia in the Los Angeles area.
In 1997, he became an FBI informant and provided crucial information about the gang as well as recorded conversations he had with various associates and members.
In August 2022, Chauvin was sent to FCI Tucson from a maximum-security Minnesota state prison to serve a 21-year federal sentence for violating George Floyd’s civil rights and a 22-and-a-half-year state sentence for second-degree murder.
In November, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed Chauvin’s appeal of his murder conviction. However, he’s currently trying his hand at overturning his federal guilty plea, stating that new evidence shows he wasn’t the reason for Floyd’s death.