George Floyd’s girlfriend testified about their shared history of opioid addiction during Thursday’s trial, describing it as a “lifelong struggle” and telling the court they had tried to get clean several times.
Courteney Ross, 45, had been dating Floyd for nearly three years before he died in May 2020. She said that both of them got addicted to opioids after being prescribed the drug for chronic pain. Despite trying many times to break their addiction, Ross and Floyd struggled throughout their three-year relationship.
“Addiction in my opinion is a lifelong struggle,” Ross said. “It’s not something that just kind of comes and goes. It’s something I’ll deal with forever.”
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Ross said that she and Floyd began getting the drugs on the black market, using other people’s prescriptions once they ran out. They both started using drugs again in March 2020, when Ross said she began seeing “changes” in Floyd’s behavior.
For a brief period, Ross said she believed they had both stopped using drugs. But in May of 2020, she once again saw behavior changes in Floyd and suspected he was using again.
Thursday was the fourth day of the murder trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who is accused of killing Floyd by kneeling on his neck for more than nine minutes. Chauvin is charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
Prosecutors have argued Chauvin is directly responsible for Floyd’s death, but the defense claimed that Floyd died of heart problems or an overdose.