Officer on video choking ex-NFL player fired

EX-NFL PLAYER Desmond Marrow was relieved Thursday after Georgia authorities said an officer caught on video choking him had been fired.

“He started screaming in joy over the phone,” Marrow’s attorney, Chris Stewart, told the Daily News after the Henry County district attorney also said a felony charge against Marrow had been dropped in the brutal road rage arrest last year.

Video of Marrow’s Dec. 2 arrest showed a group of officers slamming his head into the back of a truck in a McDonough, Ga., parking lot. The video, which was recorded by an anonymous bystander, showed Officer David Rose choking Marrow, 29, and pressing his head against the ground, seemingly causing him to lose consciousness.

“I can’t breathe!” the former Houston Texans player can be heard screaming in the recording, echoing the chilling final words Eric Garner of Staten Island uttered after an NYPD officer put him in a banned chokehold in July 2014.

Henry County Police Chief Mark Amerman said he fired Rose because, in addition to using “unnecessary force,” he was caught on his own dashcam saying he would leave certain details out of his police report.

“Rose was recorded stating that he choked Mr. Marrow,” Amerman said in a statement. “He was also recorded stating that he was not going to write that information in his report.”

District Attorney Darius Patillo said it was his duty to drop several of the charges against Marrow, which included felony obstruction of an officer and making terroristic threats.

“There is insufficient evidence to present any felony charges to a grand jury,” Patillo said in a statement. He added his office had transferred Marrow’s misdemeanor charges of reckless and aggressive driving to a solicitor general for review.

Marrow’s harrowing arrest occurred after someone threw a cup of coffee on his windshield while he was driving on an interstate near his home. The ex-footballer chased after the unidentified driver, ending up in a shopping center parking lot.

A bystander caught the arrest that ensued on video and provided cops with the recording the same day, according to Stewart.

But Stewart said the recording didn’t prompt police action until the bystander also sent it to Marrow last month. Marrow posted it on Instagram and it quickly went viral, prompting the DA to open an investigation.

Stewart said his client has suffered severe headaches since his arrest and is seeing a neurologist to determine whether he suffered brain damage.

Stewart also says he has notified local officials that his client intends to file a lawsuit, unless the county is prepared to settle the matter outside of court. The attorney, who has defended other high-profile police brutality cases, including the deaths of Alton Sterling and Walter Scott, said he was encouraged by Henry County’s swift response.

“This should be a blueprint for excessive force situations across the county,” Stewart told The News. “You don’t get justice like this all the time.”