MANHATTAN (CN) – Heeding a judge’s recent recommendation, the commissioner of the New York City Police Department announced Monday afternoon that he will fire the police officer who killed Eric Garner in a chokehold five years ago.
"It is clear that Daniel Pantaleo can no longer effectively serve as a New York City police officer," Commissioner James O’Neill said at a press conference.
Pantaleo, 34, had stayed on the force – stripped of his badge and gun but still reportedly collecting up to $120,000 per year – while stationed to desk duty in the Staten Island borough command since Garner’s killing on July 17, 2014.
Though he never faced criminal charges over the incident, Pantaleo went on trial this spring before the Civilian Complaint Review Board, an internal disciplinary body within the NYPD.
Those proceedings ended with NYPD Deputy Commissioner of Trials Rosemarie Maldonado finding Pantaleo guilty on Aug. 2 of one count of recklessly causing physical injury and not guilty of a count of strangulation with intent to impede breathing.
O’Neill said this afternoon that he agreed with her finding, but "that has certainly not made it an easy decision."
"In carrying out the court’s verdict in this case, I take no pleasure," O'Neill said, adding that "today is a day of reckoning but can also be a day of reconciliation."
Garner was killed outside the Staten Island ferry as police tried to arrest him for selling loose cigarettes. A bystander’s footage of the altercation captured Garner’s last words, “I can’t breathe,” which the 43-year-old father had gasped repeatedly as Pantaleo attempted to subdue him with an arm across Garner’s windpipe.
"I can tell you that had I been in Officer Pantaleo's situation, I may have made similar mistakes," O'Neill said. "And had I made those mistakes, I would have wished I had used the arrival of backup officers to give the situation more time to make that arrest. And I would have wished I released my grip before it became a chokehold.
"Every time I watch that video, I say to myself, as probably all of you do, to Mr. Garner, ‘don’t do it; comply.' Officer Pantaleo, ‘Don’t do it.’ … but none of us can take back our decisions," O'Neill added. "Most especially when they lead to the death of another human being."
Garner had weighed 395 pounds before his death and also suffered from numerous health ailments, including asthma and diabetes. His heart was nearly double the size of a person in good health, traits that the commissioner alluded to in this afternoon's statement.
"It is unlikely that Mr. Garner though he was in such poor health that a brief struggle with the police would cause his death," O'Neill said. "He should have decided against resisting arrest, but a man with a family lost his life, and that is an irreversible tragedy.
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