'I Can't Breathe': Man Dies After Pleading with Officer Attempting to Detain Him in Minneapolis!!!
'I Can't Breathe': Man Dies After Pleading with Officer Attempting to Detain Him in Minneapolis!!!
First Name Tom, Last Name Foolery… And I’m Everybody’s Uncle!
Especially this innocent sufferer… George Floyd.
A man exclaiming "I can't breathe" as a Minneapolis police officer pinned him to the ground & put his knee on the man's neck for about eight minutes died Monday night, prompting the FBI & the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to step in & investigate.
Video of the incident shows that a white police officer had a black man pinned to the ground next to the back tire of his patrol car with his knee on the man's neck.
"Please, please, please, I can't breathe," the man begs.
"My stomach hurts. My neck hurts. Please, please. I can't breathe."
Onlookers outside the Minneapolis deli urge the officer to get off the man.
"You're stopping his breathing right now, you think that's cool?" one man says.
"His nose is bleeding. Look at his nose!" says a woman.
The officer does not budge.
And then the man goes silent. More people begin to intervene & call for the officer or his partner to check for a pulse. The officer remains on the man's neck, even as he lies apparently unresponsive, for a total of about eight minutes before paramedics arrive & the man is placed on a stretcher.
"The man looked already dead before the ambulance even got there. He was clearly trying to tell them he couldn't breathe, & they ignored him," Darnella Frazier, one of the people who recorded the incident, told NBC News.
NBC News does not know what happened before the video recording began.
Civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump said in a statement that he was representing the family of the man, whom he identified as George Floyd.
"We all watched the horrific death of George Floyd on video as witnesses begged the police officer to take him into the police car & get off his neck. This abusive, excessive & inhumane use of force cost the life of a man who was being detained by police for questioning about a non-violent charge," Crump said.
"We will seek justice for the family of George Floyd, as we demand answers from the Minneapolis Police Department," Crump added.
"How many 'while black' deaths will it take until the racial profiling & undervaluing of black lives by police finally ends."
Minneapolis police said in a statement early Tuesday that the officers had responded to a report of a forgery in progress & found the suspect in his car. He stepped out of the car when he was ordered to, police said, but then physically resisted officers.
In a statement, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., said: "Justice must be served for this man & his family, justice must be served for our community, & justice must be served for our country."
"We heard his repeated calls for help. We heard him say over & over again that he could not breathe. And now we have seen yet another horrifying & gut-wrenching instance of an African American man dying," Klobuchar said.
In a statement, the American Civil Liberties Union & the ACLU of Minnesota called for a fair investigation & justice for Floyd.
"Nearly six years after Eric Garner's death in New York — & four years after Philando Castile's in Minnesota — this tragic video shows how little meaningful change has emerged to prevent police from taking the lives of Black people," said Paige Fernandez, policing policy adviser for the national ACLU.
"Make no mistake: George Floyd should be alive today. The officers responsible must be held accountable."
"The public has seen the video," Fernandez added. "To call this a 'medical incident' is an insult."
Climb on The Family Tree below & share your thoughts about My Nephew George Floyd’s pleading situation!
By: Elisha Fieldstadt
Image(s): Getty
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