VIDEO: NY man dies after police place him in chokehold for selling untaxed cigarettes

I have a feeling im going to run into something like this happening

I am not looking forward to that day

Maybe we need to start a crowdfund to pay defense costs of peopke who defend a person from the
police?

a reply to: Char-Lee

Indeed it was a strangle. A completely legal strangle hold! I already stated that... My point is that a strangle hold to subdue someone, then putting weight on their head is quite effective, safe, and well practiced as a method to gain control of another person.

As for the number of cops that arrived, how is that relevant to brutality??

This isn't a case of brutality, I would be that one man who hung the jury.

St 6:20 you can see the guy laughing in the background and at 7:40 he's even waving to the cam..

originally posted by: doompornjunkie
a reply to: Char-Lee

Indeed it was a strangle. A completely legal strangle hold! I already stated that... My point is that a strangle hold to subdue someone, then putting weight on their head is quite effective, safe, and well practiced as a method to gain control of another person.

As for the number of cops that arrived, how is that relevant to brutality??

This isn't a case of brutality, I would be that one man who hung the jury.

I can only say that I am 100% sure that it it was you or a loved one standing there saying...officer i am just standing here minding my own business! Than a dozen men grab you even though you hit know one didn't have a weapon...strangle you and kill you...it would NOT be OK!

They could have talked to this guy clearly he was not fighting. They could have explained they had to arrest him, if that was truly necessary, he was clearly feeling harassed but he did not ball his fist or any action of violence!

originally posted by: Hellas
St 6:20 you can see the guy laughing in the background and at 7:40 he's even waving to the cam..

Yeah kind of hard to know what to do when you murder someone who didn't even hit you, might as well chuckle I guess!
No one even let his arms lose, the medical care talks to him like he is alive are they dumb...if he was alive he should have had respirators or CPR! How sick!

originally posted by: doompornjunkie
a reply to: Char-Lee

Indeed it was a strangle. A completely legal strangle hold! I already stated that... My point is that a strangle hold to subdue someone, then putting weight on their head is quite effective, safe, and well practiced as a method to gain control of another person.

As for the number of cops that arrived, how is that relevant to brutality??

This isn't a case of brutality, I would be that one man who hung the jury.

To you it is completely legal to walk up and put a strangle hold on someone for no reason?

originally posted by: chrismarco
a reply to: alienjuggalo
I don't assume that the cop putting the choke hold on the person wanted him dead.

But did he care?

And of course if he were to fight back to PROTECT HIMSELF, he'd be labeled the "bad" guy. Yeah, these pigs can do no wrong can they... S*** like this makes me so irate. Nothing but CRIMINALS with badges these days... ugh. RIP, guy.

a reply to: Kromlech

The real bottom line is that most of what police do is not the reason we have police.

This guy was hawking cheap cigarettes? How does stopping that fall under the banner of "protect and serve" who are they working for the Fed, Tobacco Companies, IRS... I don't even know.

The definition of criminal has become way too loose, be out there, to top murderers and thief's, rapists and molester's the rest of this stuff is way too gray

a reply to: criticalhit

That's what I was thinking. I mean why the hell do the cops even care if he is selling single cigarettes? And why would they need 4 cops for that?

Don't these power tripping a-holes have something better to do.

Hypocrites, every last one of them..

I am hearing something totally different.

I am hearing the stranglehold is ILLEGAL and banned in the state of New York.

Can someone confirm this.

originally posted by: criticalhit
a reply to: Kromlech

The real bottom line is that most of what police do is not the reason we have police.

This guy was hawking cheap cigarettes? How does stopping that fall under the banner of "protect and serve" who are they working for the Fed, Tobacco Companies, IRS... I don't even know.

The definition of criminal has become way too loose, be out there, to top murderers and thief's, rapists and molester's the rest of this stuff is way too gray

It's illegal to sell untaxed cigarettes. If he was under suspicion of that the police are right to investigate. What the police were not right to do, is to go up to the guy and use a choke hold. If use of force was needed we have tazers or if it really escalated that's what guns are for. If the man is cooperating no force is needed.

The cop just wanted to assault someone to feel tough. There is never a place for a choke hold. There's safer ways of subduing someone for both the officer and the suspect.

originally posted by: Aazadan
It's illegal to sell untaxed cigarettes.

And there is a show in America called "Moonshiners" where they follow around both the illegal moonshiners and the cops but the two never seem to know where the others are?

And we call it entertainment. And we even know the names and residences of the illegal moonshiners but the cops never bust them.

But this poor man had 25 cops on him choking him to death for a similar act?

I just heard about this today...

I truly wonder when people will start rising up against the police when they act this way..

The point is, why is it when the man first states he cannot breath did they not stop their action and make sure he was legitimately having issues.

Lets look into this.

Firstly the police will say they have to continue their action of restraint before they can assess the suspect being restrained as they don't know if they are being truthful of not; perhaps he is saying he can't breath in order for them to back off so he can make a run for it, or even pursue his own act of aggression against them.

However!!

In this case leading up to them taking restraining action on the subject it was clear he was not posing any danger. His body language, the way he conducting himself was not threatening (how i saw it), it was just a man who seem to be confused as to what this issue was, and was somewhat emotionally stressed, due to the situation; again I did not see him as acting aggressively, or posing a threat.

Therefore, when he said he couldn't breath, why not give this man the benefit of the doubt, back up off him, stop the restraint action as he was posing no threat up until they jumped him, and see if his complaint of not being able to breath was legitimate, thus he may have been able to tell you he suffers from breathing issues. Instead they continue restraining him with excessive force while he is telling them clearly he cannot breath, thus putting him in mortal danger.

The police are there to protect us, where was this mans protection from the police who cared little for his life, and ignoring his medical condition, and breathing problems.

The man who choked him should be placed directly under arrest for aggravated homicide. they maybe police, but are they above the law?

If the police are allowed to disregard the life of a suspect in order to full fill their duties before the suspect has even been convicted of charged with a crime surly is against the man right to life. His life was taken away from by police officers who hadn't even charged him, and callously ignores his cries for help.

The police are becoming a scary force..

The real problem is the "culture of arrest" in the United States for every little incident and perceived infraction.

Speeding? You're under arrest!
Talk back to the Police? You're under arrest!
Unpaid Parking Tickets? You're under arrest!
Expired Vehicle Tags? You're under arrest!
etc.....

Of course, add this to the macho-man antics encouraged by the "Bad boys, bad boys...whatcha gonna do..." portrayal of Cops on TV. Pile on the anti-hero worship of movie characters like Dirty Harry et al - you know, the Cops who never listen to their bosses, play by their own set of rules, blast first and ask questions...never...and leave long trails of bodies in their wake.

Compounded by the code-of-silence when brother officers colour outside of the lines...the very common tactic of charging the victims of "over policing" with multiple offences (Assault, Obstruction, Resisting, etc.) ...the justice system collaboration of Prosecutors and Judges (who will most often side with the Police version of events in "his word against his" situations)...results in a overall climate of over-jealousness and near impunity for Police persons who go too far.

Every time a police-citizen encounter goes down the path leading to an arrest, the odds of physical harm coming to either (or both) participants goes up exponentially. Therefore, logically, to avoid tragedies like this one, policing policy should be to use restraint and arrest only as a last resort. This notion should extend to the way in which lawmakers craft the repercussions of crimes and misdemeanours.

I might also add that the legal concept of "use of excessive force" should extend to the actions of Officers (including when 5 men tackle one) in executing an arrest - and should take into consideration the injuries suffered when excessive force is used (as is clearly the case here).

a reply to: alienjuggalo

Really upsetting. They put all that effort into wrestling him down caused his cardiac arrest and kills him and they can't check a pulse or pump his heart! Gotta tax a lot of cigarettes now so you can pay his family millions. What a bunch of worthless Idiots. Garbage precinct. This is a clear breakdown of society. He probably had no job. See how sick our society is? Arrest or kill a man over untaxed cigarettes and throw him in jail so it costs that same society 40k a year to house him in jail. Now if a man could support himself on a honest job there would be no crime and you wouldn't need 6:1 cops and on every street corner. Someone has created a petition to stop police brutality. Think it will ever see the light? I don't think so. It needed 100k signatures and it's 99,996 or something. Obama is to busy being catered to with my taxes. Ironic.

originally posted by: doompornjunkie
a reply to: alienjuggalo

This is not a case of police brutality! The officer never slammed his head into the ground, and didn't even keep him in the hold for long, just long enough to bring the man down. This is just a tragic death. Although 9 times out of 10 I agree with the OPs in this forum, this time I cannot. That officer followed sound procedures throughout the arrest. A head lock to bring someone down, then pinning their head to the ground is quite effective and normally safe. It is widely taught in self defense and in martial arts. Control their head and you control their body.

Arrest that cop for murder!
No, at best it would be involuntary man-slaughter.

Where are the tazers?!
Good one, use a tazer, then when ever someone dies from use of a tazer everyone gets all uppity and demands justice.

S*** happens...s*** just happens sometimes.

People need to remember that instead of yelling brutality in cases such as this. Save all the cackling for true police brutality cases, like the horrific ones that seem to be pouring in more and more frequently.

NY City has a ban on use of the chokehold by their officers, so how is this not murder if the officer used a banned tactic. If it was banned, they clearly know the dangers of this tactic.

At the center of the inquiry is the officer’s use of a chokehold — a dangerous maneuver that was banned by the New York Police Department more than 20 years ago but that the department cannot seem to be rid of.

“As defined in the department’s patrol guide, this would appear to have been a chokehold,” the police commissioner, William J. Bratton, said at a news conference in City Hall on Friday afternoon.

He referred to police rules that forbid chokeholds and define them as including “any pressure to the throat or windpipe, which may prevent or hinder breathing or reduce intake of air.”

Speachless