MINNEAPOLIS -- Four Minneapolis officers involved in the arrest of a handcuffed black man who died in police custody were fired Tuesday, hours after a bystander's video showed the man pleading that he could not breathe as a white officer knelt on his neck.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey announced the firings on Twitter, saying, "This is the right call."
The man's death Monday night after he struggled with officers was under investigation by the FBI and state law enforcement authorities.
Frey apologized to the black community early Tuesday in a post on his Facebook page.
"Being Black in America should not be a death sentence. For five minutes, we watched a white officer press his knee into a Black man's neck. Five minutes. When you hear someone calling for help, you're supposed to help. This officer failed in the most basic, human sense," Frey posted.
Police said the man matched the description of a suspect in a forgery case at a grocery store, and that he resisted arrest. "Please, please, please, I can't breathe. Please, man," the man, who is handcuffed, is heard telling the officer.
[Video not showing up above? Click here to watch » https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN7WHFvZIHw]
Several witnesses had gathered on a nearby sidewalk, some recording the scene on their phones. The bystanders became increasingly agitated as the man pleaded with police. One bystander told officers they needed to let him breathe. Another yelled at them to check the man's pulse.
The victim was identified as George Floyd by Ben Crump, a prominent civil-rights and personal injury attorney who said he had been hired by Floyd's family.
"We all watched the horrific death of George Floyd on video as witnesses begged the police officer to take him into the police car and get off his neck," Crump said in a statement. "This abusive, excessive and inhumane use of force cost the life of a man who was being detained by the police for questioning about a nonviolent charge."
Charles McMillian, 60, of Minneapolis, said he saw police trying to get Floyd into the back of the squad car and heard Floyd tell them he was claustrophobic.
After having the officer's knee on his neck, McMillian said, the man started calling his mother's name, "and then he died."
Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo said the department would conduct a full internal investigation.
Andrew Scott, a former Boca Raton, Fla., police chief who now testifies as an expert witness in use-of-force cases, called Floyd's death "a combination of not being trained properly or disregarding their training."
"He couldn't move. He was telling them he couldn't breathe, and they ignored him," Scott said. "I can't even describe it. It was difficult to watch."
[Video not showing up above? Click here to watch » https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbxRn5A_JDo]
In Minneapolis, kneeling on a suspect's neck is allowed under the department's use-of-force policy for officers who have received training in how to compress a neck without applying direct pressure to the airway. It is considered a "non-deadly force option," according to the department's policy handbook.
The police union asked the public to wait for the investigation to take its course and not to "rush to judgment and immediately condemn our officers." The Hennepin County attorney's office, which would handle any prosecution of police on state charges, said in a statement that it was "shocked and saddened" by the video and pledged to handle the case fairly. The U.S. attorney's office in Minnesota declined comment.
All body camera footage in the Minneapolis case was turned over to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and the agency asked to speak with anyone who saw the arrest or recorded video. The agency said the officers' names will be released after initial interviews with the people involved and witnesses.
The FBI is conducting a separate federal civil-rights investigation, at the request of Minneapolis police, the state bureau said. Messages left with the FBI were not immediately returned.
Information for this article was contributed by Gretchen Ehlke and Todd Richmond of The Associated Press.
A Section on 05/27/2020