As far as a New York City Police Department internal report is concerned, the unarmed, asthmatic father of six who was seen apparently placed in a choke hold by an officer “did not appear to be in great distress,” and his “condition did not seem serious and … he did not appear to get worse,” the New York Daily News reports.
That was the account given by two supervising officers, Sgt. Dhanan Saminath and Sgt. Kizzy Adonis, according to the site.
According to the Daily News, the report, which was drawn up after Eric Garner’s death last week in Staten Island, detailed the apparent lack of distress from their perspective, despite the fact that Garner repeatedly said that he couldn’t breathe. The report also made no mention of the apparent choke hold one officer used to hold the 43-year-old father.
However, with a video of the incident rapidly circulating online since that day, everyone seems to have formed an opinion about what happened, even New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio from his vacation in Italy, who told reporters, “As an individual who’s no expert in law enforcement, it looked like a choke hold to me.”
“I … emphasize that you need a full investigation, because all sides need to be heard and all evidence looked at,” he added, offering no comment on how he thought the involved officers should be handled.
Some, like Garner’s 65-year-old mother, Gwen Carr, are grateful that the shocking video exists, so that all parties can be held accountable. “I don’t want him to have died in vain,” she told the news site. “As people see, it’s just a godsend that we have the video. Just look at the tape.
“It’s just a lack of humanity,” the mother added. “That’s what it was. He was nothing to them, but he was our people. He was just a big guy on the street.”
Read more at the New York Daily News.