Did Police "Choke" NY Man to Death? (Gracie Breakdown)

[Jack LaBarge]

On July 17, 2014, Eric Garner (6' 4" - 350 lbs) died immediately after an altercation with officers of the New York Police Department regarding the selling of un-taxed cigarettes. The incident was caught on video, and during the altercation one of the officers applied a neck restraint to control Mr. Garner and get him to the ground. Although the mainstream media has clung onto the idea that the "choke-hold" is what caused my Garner's death, Ryron and Rener offer their own opinions on the incident based on their experience as life-long jiu-jitsu practitioners and lead defensive tactics instructors of the Gracie Survival Tactics (GST) program for law enforcement. The Gracie brothers also discuss the challenges that arise when arresting subjects with pre-existing medical conditions and demonstrate some of the GST techniques that enable officers to control and arrest unruly subjects with the least amount of force possible.

[David Rosado]

Extended version of the incident.

http://youtu.be/ajhpFT-lVZY


They killed him.

[Tim Bruhn]

My 2cents.

Is it extremely sad this occurred over what seems so petty, yes.

Did the cop use an appropriate technique to subdue him, no.

Did the choke cause his death, no.

Could it have been handled differently, maybe AND

Would he still be alive if he had simply allowed the police to handcuff him and process him, yes.

You fight/argue charges in court, once the police have the intention of charging you and processing you any resistance/argument only makes it worse and ZERO positive can come from it.

In this case sadly it resulted in death, hopefully everyone can learn from it.

Edit - After watching the extended vid, should the cop in the '99' jersey that waved at the camera face disciplinary action, yes.

[Chris Garry]

Smh

[Apperz]

The way he was screaming 'I can't breath' makes it seem as though they crushed his wind pipe or he had an asthma attack. To me that suggests an accident in terms of the action itself (note: I am not saying that to forcibly subdue him was the right action, I'm saying that once the choice to subdue him has been made I don't think they tried to hurt/kill him). It wasn't as if the guy choked him out and help the choke on for 45 seconds or something (which is what I feared when I heard about this story). In fact, as soon as the guy shouts 'I can't breathe' the guy releases the hold.

The guy waving at the camera though… I just don't have words for that. Absolutely disgusting.

As the Gracies say: a guy lost his life over selling untaxed cigarettes. Nothing about this is acceptable.

[David Rosado]

In fact, as soon as the guy shouts 'I can't breathe' the guy releases the hold.

You may have been watching with very low volume. He's saying he can't breathe from the beginning and the cop holds it a bit longer.

[David Rosado]

I'd like to hear what a law enforcement officer has to say. Maybe I'm not up to date on acceptable takedown methods, but I don't beleive the choke hold is one of those acceptable moves.

Granted, the video appears edited. I'm not sure if they did inform him that he is being detained. If they did, then he should've lawyered up. But he didn't need to lose his life over it.

Problem number one: escalation. They went from 0-60 too fast. The only things left were to use weapons. Hell, pepper spray would've been a better idea than a choke hold.

Problem number two: medical attention. It's not hard to tell when a guy stops breathing. At that point, you get medical attention. CPR. Anything. Instead they try to act like the guy is still alive.


They killed him. Whether it was the choke hold or negligence. Either way, they killed him. If they did everything correctly to bring him down and cuff him, fine. But once they saw that he was clearly not breathing, they killed him by doing little to nothing to keep him alive.

[Jack LaBarge]

[Chrismasonic]

result of over aggressive tactics, no knowledge of airway management and emergency first aid...

[David Rosado]

Murder and manslaugher are different things. But in the end they're similar in that one party kills another party. Was it deliberate? No. So it wasn't murder. Fine. They can get away with that technicality like George Zimmerman got away with that technicality. But their actions led to his death. Their negligence led to his death. The appropriate charges should be brought up. If they at least tried to keep the guy alive, then we can dismiss this. But the man died due to negligence. There is no way around that.

Here's another video for you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vT66U_Ftdng


At the end they ask, why isn't anyone doing CPR? The cops claims the guy is breathing. That's straight up stupid. When a person suffers cardiac arrest, they are often still breathing. It's just shallow gasps. The guy, if he actually was breathing (which I doubt) was showing classic signs of cardiac arrest and they did nothing about it. They didn't need to do full blown CPR. But they should've been at least trying with chest compressions.

http://heart.arizona.edu/frequently-asked-questions

A man died as a result of their actions in their custody. That's the beginning and end of the story. Evertythign else is arguing techincalities.