Approximately five months ago, a man named Eric Garner died at the hands of police officers. The reason? He was resisting arrest, him being accused of selling untaxed cigarettes. He was confronted by two plainclothes officers. Mr. Garner then became angry, shouting at the officers, saying "I'm tired of this." Soon, both of the policemen tackled him, one of the officers wrapping his arm around Garner's neck and pulling it. Other police came to assist them. However, Eric Garner was complaining that he couldn't breathe, yet none of the officers happened to respond. He then stopped talking and remained motionless. Mr. Garner was pronounced dead soon after. Unlike other cases, his death was videotaped.
The Evidence: [url]http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/22/opinion/louis-garner-broken-windows/index.html?hpt=hp_t1[/url]
The Video: [url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1ka4oKu1jo[/url]
The Verdict: [url]http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/03/justice/new-york-grand-jury-chokehold/index.html?hpt=hp_t1[/url]
Now, the police officer who performed the fatal move walks free. This incident paints a gloomy picture the sad situation America is in, how some malicious people are able to pervert justice and get away with it.
So how do you feel about this issue? Are current laws in place sufficient enough to prevent police brutality? Have some law enforcement officials been able to 'get away with murder?' Has the justice system benefited all Americans?
First off, I don't think this is a case of police brutality. There is a trivial sense in which excessive force was used, in virtue of the fact that the NYPD does not allow officers to use chokeholds in restraining suspects. I'm not sure if even this fact constitutes excessive force. Perhaps the chokehold is better classified as a violation of police procedure.
I watched the video. I saw two officers attempt to detain Garner (presumably by placing him in handcuffs). Garner was non-compliant, which leaves officers 2 options: tase the individual or go 'hands on' with him. I don't see a taser (or pepper spray, for that matter) being terrible effective against a 300lb. individual. In any case, the decision to go hands on seemed justified. This is the point at which the chokehold was used, against police policy. And to be clear, it seems to have been applied for around 2 second.
Some are commenting on the fact that Garner repeatedly said that he can't breathe. Not only is this a *very* common complain that officers hear, but it is also one that gets blown out of proportion - especially in this case. An individual who states that they can't breathe obviously can breathe. Otherwise, they wouldn't be able to speak. Instead, some people seem to be suggesting that the officer basically choked him to death. There's simply no way this is true.
At the end of the day, we have an individual who was committing a (admittedly minor) crime, who resisted resist despite having asthma, and died afterwards. I had heard earlier reports that he died from basically being crushed. This would be problematic for the arresting officers. But it seems more likely that he died from either a heart attack or complications from asthma.
In short, this particular case doesn't speak to any widespread police brutality or police getting away with murder. I'm not say that there isn't a problem - I'm just saying that this particular case doesn't get us that result.
I think police brutality that needs to be used and thread around very cautiously. I'm going to say it can go both ways here. If you're innocent, just comply with the officers and at the end of the day, nothing will happen. Retaliate, resist arrest, and an officer will automatically assume, rather sensibly, that you're a dangerous criminal subject who needs to be restrained.
Put yourself in the officer's shoes. You would want to a) Do your job efficiently with minimal force, b)Prevent any potential harm to individuals c) Keep yourself safe. In the heat of the moment, it would be extremely hard to follow a rational judgement, but one would revert to standard protocol.
I was trained in the army, while on patrol to shoot with minimal provocation. We would yell at an approaching suspicious suspect to keep away, and then fire a warning shot in the air to keep him away if he continues. If he keeps approaching, even if he had no weapons, even if he was only protesting, we would shoot his limbs. Fire first, questions later. If he kept coming, we would shoot his torso.
Furthermore, law enforcement officers often have to make split second decisions, and if the suspect has additional medical conditions but still resists, it feels overly harsh to fault them for causing additional harm. We don't take chances at all, and I can very much empathize with the officers here. It's another reason I tend not to sympathize wholly with Michael Brown.
Another thing I saw from the video that perturbs me is the reverse racism, which crops up in many alleged cases of police brutality. Try as much as they can, the whites don't seem to get a break. It seems fine and dandy for minorities to just casually spout general stereotypes like "White Texan racist cops", but woe betide anyone doing the reverse, even with hard facts. If we can't even stamp out reverse racism, can we claim to be a truly egalitarian society?
Skip to about 1:35. The hold lasts from 1:39 to 1:52.
The human body can survive for 3 minutes without oxygen, most people can hold their breath for at least a minute. 13 seconds is far from lethal force under ordinary circumstances.
The ability to exhale does not imply the ability to inhale.
With compression of the throat it does. If the cop was sitting on the guys chest it would be reasonable that someone could exhale but not be able to expand his chest enough to inhale. With compression of the throat, as long as his throat is open enough to allow air to move one way it's open enough to allow air the other way. The obvious exception being internal blockages like the inflammation caused by asthma, which often makes it difficult to do one without directly impeding the other.
Nice MSNBC link btw. Yet more people shouting about racist police. It doesn't matter that the video shows him resisting arrest. It doesn't matter that he was more than twice the size of the cop talking to him. It doesn't even matter that the chokehold was over by the 1:52 mark yet he's still saying "I can't breathe" well after 2:00. It doesn't matter that he can be seen breathing at the 3:27 mark and heard coffing when there were no cops on him and he was not in a chokehold. He was put in a chokehold by a white cop and he was black therefore the cops must be racist.
Which is why compression of the chest was a factor. He couldn't support his weight while prone.
Compression of the chest also has nothing to do with a chokehold and could have occurred with any authorized technique for physically apprehending someone resisting arrest. He was a 400 lb asthmatic, any compression of the chest or blunt force trauma to the chest could have killed him. Any force capable of incapacitating someone risks killing them especially when they have a pre-existing condition, and cops can't be expected to know when someone has an illness that could kill them.
