He couldn't "simply" get in the car. He was clostophobic. Don't you hear good?

He clearly said (while breathing) that he couldn't breathe and was clostophobic. Ergo, they should have just let him go.

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Posted by RazorBroncs

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Member since Sep 2013

15946 posts

Posted on 8/6/20 at 3:55 pm to Mithridates6

quote:
What's the recommended method of restraint? Seems like it would be hard to achieve without holding him down with your full weight, but I suppose the knee would've ideally been on his back instead of neck

You're correct in your assumption, as a Fed officer I was trained to put my knee on the small of the back or between the shoulder blades. This basically "pins" a suspect down until they can calm down and be reasoned with - i.e. "you aren't getting out of this, so you might as well make it easy on yourself."

I can't tell you how many times I've heard similar to "you're hurting me!" or "I'm claustrophobic so I'm freaking out about getting in the car!" or "I can't breathe, stop hurting me!" You can barely be touching some, (or even not at all in some cases) and they'll scream bloody murder. These cops are conditioned to it and used to it, it's extremely common.

I saw absolutely nothing wrong with their actions in this portion of the video, they handled it about as well as any officer could've (including the Feds). Floyd was so jittery, resistant, obnoxious with his yelling and pleading, etc. it would be almost impossible to tell he was having medical issues and "trouble breathing." This stuff is feigned so many times and so often that unless there's a clear sign the perp is struggling (like gasping for air, clutching his chest, eyes rolling back, suddenly quiet, etc) the officers HAD to have believed it was all a show. I probably would've, in their shoes.

It's still hard to say the kneel on the neck was 100% legitimate use of force, but after watching this I don't see how they intended to do anything other than calm Floyd and restrain him enough to get him in the car. I don't believe there was ill intent at all, just a poor outcome due to the cocktail of drugs in his system, a heightened anxiety and heartrate, and a massive panic attack.

That's just my opinion, as a federal officer. I think many, MANY other officers would be in the same position right now if they were the ones unfortunate enough to arrest Floyd that day. It was just a perfect storm that led to a shitty outcome, and the nation is burning over an incident that was out of the officers' hands.

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