AMERICA IN CHAOS
‘I can’t breathe’ vic is mourned 42 years later
Lamor Miller Whitehead was 6 weeks old when his father, revered Brooklyn businessman Arthur Miller, died in a cop’s billy club chokehold.
Forty-two years later, the loss no less painful, Whitehead wonders why it’s taken so long for society to embrace police reform.
“Today is a difficult day for me,” Whitehead said Sunday, standing at the corner of Nostrand Ave. and Park Place, where his dad died in 1978. “These officers took some of my future away. … I don’t hate police, I hate the spirit of racism.”
“It’s not about police, it’s about the culture of racism,” Whitehead said.
Miller (inset), a 30-year-old black businessman and civic leader, died after an arresting officer used a nightstick to choke him into submission on June 14, 1978.
“Mr. Miller was the first ‘I can’t breathe’ in modern times,” Borough President Eric Adams thundered on Sunday. “If we had responded then, we’d be living in a different city and country today. A young child left without a father because the institution supposed to help and protect decided to hurt and murder.”
According to a New York Times report from 1978, two white cops, Anthony Curcio and Christopher Schiebel, were trying to serve a summons to Miller’s younger brother, Samuel, because of reports of debris that had piled up at a construction site the Millers were turning into a wedding hall.
A license check showed Samuel Miller was driving with a suspended license. He objected, however, saying he had paid his fines. The officers called for backup, and two more arrived to arrest him. When he fled, toppling a metal table in the process, about a dozen more cops rushed to the scene.
Miller’s other brothers, Arthur and Joseph, also came to the scene at one point, according to a congressional report. Arthur Miller had a licensed handgun at his waist.
In the ensuing chaos, police subdued and choked Arthur Miller. Witnesses said foam was coming from his mouth, and they could see his feet sticking out of a police car window as it drove off, the Times reported.
Arthur Miller died at the 77th Precinct stationhouse.
And though Miller’s death sparked protests and petitions, a grand jury refused to indict the officers involved.