Eric Garner family receives $5.9M, presses for charges
New York grand jury saw no cause to indict in chokehold death
The family of Eric Garner, with civil rights advocate Al Sharpton, urged Tuesday that charges be brought in Garner’s chokehold death, saying the $5.9 million settlement with the city did not provide justice in the case.
Friday will mark one year since Garner, 43, died in a confrontation with police officers on Staten Island.
The city announced the settlement Monday. No one has been charged in the case.
“They treated my husband like an animal, and I think they give animals more respect than humans,” said Garner’s wife, Esaw Snipes Garner.
Garner, other family members and Sharpton said they will continue to press for criminal charges in the case.
“This does not represent justice,” Garner’s daughter Erica said of the settlement. “We are calling on the Department of Justice and (Attorney General) Loretta Lynch to deliver justice for my father.”
Sharpton said some have tried to make the Garner family “look like money grubbers and me look like a hustler because you don’t want to deal with the chokehold.” The case is not about money, he said. “Money is not justice.”
In December, a New York City grand jury found “no reasonable cause” to indict officer Daniel Pantaleo, who placed Garner in a chokehold after receiving a com- plaint that Garner was selling cigarettes in front of a store.
The grand jury ruling came days after a similar decision in Missouri not to indict officer Darren Wilson in the widely publicized shooting death of unarmed teen Michael Brown in Ferguson. Within minutes of the Pantaleo decision, thousands of protesters took to the streets of New York; Philadelphia; San Francisco; Ferguson, Mo.; and Atlanta.
Then-U.S. attorney general Eric Holder announced a federal civil rights inquiry into Garner’s death. A medical examiner ruled Garner’s death a homicide, and several inquiries into Garner’s death remain pending.
A bystander’s cellphone video of the confrontation showed Pantaleo using the chokehold while others wrestled Garner to the ground. Garner pleaded, “I can’t breathe.”
Before the settlement was announced, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said the anniversary of Garner’s death was “on the mind of many New Yorkers.” He noted that police were being retrained and that the city was moving forward on equipping officers with body cameras, among other measures.
“This does not represent justice. We are calling on the Department of Justice and (Attorney General) Loretta Lynch to deliver justice for my father.”
Erica Garner, Eric Garner’s daughter