Daniel Pantaleo, N.Y.P.D. Officer Who Held Eric Garner in Chokehold, Is Fired

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: New York Times




The New York City police officer whose chokehold was partly blamed for Eric Garner's death in police custody in 2014 was fired from the Police Department on Monday, ending a bitter, five-year legal battle that had cast a shadow over the nation's largest police force and the city it protects.

The police commissioner, James P. O'Neill, dismissed the officer, Daniel Pantaleo, just over two weeks after a police administrative judge found him guilty of violating a department ban on chokeholds. Mr. Garner died on July 17, 2014, after Officer Pantaleo tackled him from behind, then, along with other officers, pressed him down on the pavement. Captured on video, the arrest and Mr. Garner's last words -- "I can't breathe"-- gave impetus to the Black Lives Matter movement.

The case had defined the Police Department's relationship with the public under Mayor Bill de Blasio, who campaigned for office on a promise to reverse the aggressive policing of low-level crimes -- known as the "broken windows" strategy -- that his predecessor had championed. The mayor had come under intense criticism for not pushing to have Mr. Pantaleo fired sooner.

Some elected officials and critics of the Police Department say those policies, which affected black and Latino neighborhoods disproportionately, are partly to blame for Mr. Garner's death. For many people across the country, Mr. Pantaleo became a symbol of longstanding problems with how the police treat people, mostly black and Latino, suspected of low-level crimes. Mr. Garner died as he was being arrested on charges of selling untaxed cigarettes on Staten Island.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/19/nyregion/eric-garner-daniel-pantaleo-fired.html

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ETA from CNN -

Pantaleo will not receive his NYPD pension

Daniel Pantaleo will not receive his New York Police Department pension, NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill just said.

O’Neill said whatever contributions Pantaleo has already made towards his pension will be returned to him.

https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/daniel-pantaleo-eric-garner-nypd/index.html

[Faux pas]

1. Do the Garner's

have a civil suit going? Firing just isn't ENOUGH.

[BumRushDaShow]

5. It was settled 4 years ago

Eric Garner Case Is Settled by New York City for $5.9 Million

By J. David Goodman

July 13, 2015

New York City reached a settlement with the family of Eric Garner on Monday, agreeing to pay $5.9 million to resolve a wrongful-death claim over his killing by the police on Staten Island last July, the city comptroller and a lawyer for the family said.

The agreement, reached a few days before the anniversary of Mr. Garner’s death, headed off one legal battle even as a federal inquiry into the killing and several others at the state and local level remain open and could provide a further accounting of how he died.

Still, the settlement was a pivotal moment in a case that has engulfed the city since the afternoon of July 17, 2014, when two officers approached Mr. Garner as he stood unarmed on a sidewalk, and accused him of selling untaxed cigarettes. One of the officers used a chokehold — prohibited by the Police Department — to subdue him, and that was cited by the medical examiner as a cause of Mr. Garner’s death.

The killing of Mr. Garner, 43, followed by the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, Mo., in August, set off a national debate about policing actions in minority communities and racial discrimination in the criminal justice system.


https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/14/nyregion/eric-garner-case-is-settled-by-new-york-city-for-5-9-million.html

[Faux pas]

7. How'd

I miss that?? I was born blonde and I'm choosing it as a defense for any air headedness I display.

[BumRushDaShow]

8. Garner was killed 7 months after de Blasio had been sworn in for his first term as mayor

so I expect de Blasio worked at cleaning that mess up quick, fast, and in a hurry. I can imagine what the outcome might have been if Bloomberg had still been mayor (let alone Ghouliani).

Sadly there was so much awful happening during that time that I can see how it might have been missed. Aside from the issues that some may have with BLM, I think they were key in keeping this fight going.

[Bengus81]

2. And in a few weeks,new job in a smaller city........

in a different State.

[dem4decades]

6. Maybe security at a private golf club?

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

12. Sad to say you're probably right.

[jaysunb]

3. Eric Garner is dead. n/t

[brush]

4. There should be repercussions for those who declined to do this years ago.

[TryLogic]

9. Got fired, for what appeared to be second degree murder???

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

10. Is he still allowed to carry a gun? n/t

[Historic NY]

14. Not on a shield or retirement, he'd have to get a permit...

and he won't be eligible for nationwide either.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

20. Cops fired for cause should be added to the NICS prohibited list

Analogous to those prohibited due to dishonorable discharge.

[RAB910]

11. Better than nothing

[bitterross]

13. Cue the Police Union to file suit to overturn all this

There's even a statement from them in the CNN article that indicates they're not happy that the guy got any punishment

[BumRushDaShow]

15. My response

fuck 'em. It took 6 years but a similar fate happened in the very same city after cops mowed down Sean Bell in a fusillade of bullets in 2006, so this wasn't their first rodeo -

Officer in Bell Killing Is Fired; 3 Others to Be Forced Out

By MATT FLEGENHEIMER and AL BAKERMARCH 23, 2012


The New York City police detective who fired the first shots in the 50-bullet barrage that killed Sean Bell in 2006 has been fired, and three others involved in the shooting are being forced to resign, law enforcement officials said on Friday. The decision came after a Police Department administrative trial in the fall found that the detective, Gescard F. Isnora, had acted improperly in the shooting that killed Mr. Bell on what was supposed to have been his wedding day and that he should be fired.

“There was nothing in the record to warrant overturning the decision of the department’s trial judge,” Deputy Commissioner Paul J. Browne said on Friday night. Law enforcement officials said word of Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly’s decision came late Friday. Detective Isnora, an 11-year veteran, will not collect a pension, one official said. “He loses everything,” the official said.

Three other officers — Detectives Marc Cooper and Michael Oliver, who fired shots at Mr. Bell; and Lt. Gary Napoli, a supervisor who was at the scene but did not fire any shots — are being forced to resign. A fourth officer who fired his gun during the episode, Detective Paul Headley, has already left the department, and a fifth, Officer Michael Carey, was exonerated in the department’s administrative trial. Detective Cooper and Lieutenant Napoli, who worked in the department for more than 20 years, will receive their pensions, a law enforcement official said. Detective Oliver, who has served for 18 years, may collect on a pension on the 20th anniversary of his start date, the official said.

The shooting of Mr. Bell, 23, who did not have a gun, occurred in the early morning on Nov. 25, 2006, as Mr. Bell and two friends were leaving a strip club in Jamaica, Queens, where they had been celebrating. The case drew widespread scrutiny of undercover police tactics.

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/nyregion/in-sean-bell-killing-4-officers-to-be-forced-out.html

[Shoonra]

16. But there was another officer ....

Besides the cop who applied the chokehold, there was another officer, a policewoman who sucker punched Garner in the chest, which was calculated to make him take the defensive posture that the cops used to justify grabbing him in a chokehold. Nothing has been done to that policewoman but I blame her at least as much as the guy who applied the chokehold.

[BumRushDaShow]

18. In the OP article, there was this -

Besides Officer Pantaleo, Mr. Garner’s family has pointed out that there are at least 11 other officers who should be held accountable for their actions leading up to Mr. Garner’s death and the aftermath. Only one — Sgt. Kizzy Adonis, who was the first supervisor to arrive on the scene — faces discipline.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/19/nyregion/daniel-pantaleo-fired.html

I was listening to a presser by the Garner family lawyer and Sharpton earlier this afternoon (WaPo was broadcasting it) and I think they may be trying to push for empaneling a new grand jury to look at a whole bunch of things involving this case (I expect including dealing with these other officers too since the now-fired officer had originally been acquitted by a grand jury).. if I remember hearing him correctly (may have been in response to a question). His presser is here -

[PatrickforO]

17. He looks like a real power-trip kind of guy.

And look at the hatred in his eyes. Glad I'm not his wife or one of his kids.

Soon, since he's not in prison, he'll get on with some department somewhere, probably in a deep red area, and do it again.

[tblue37]

19. I'm guessing his bulk is from steroids. nt

[Progressive Jones]

21. Good riddance. nt

[TexasBushwhacker]

22. He's 34 and has been on the force since 2006

He's not elegible for a pension yet.

[BumRushDaShow]

23. Usually LEO are eligible at 50

meaning he would have 16 years to go. But I expect what they are saying is that when he does become eligible, he will be forbidden from applying for it. I believe the article mentioned that they will be returning his contributions to the fund however (but obviously not the matching contributions from the city).

[BlueStater]

24. Fired? He should be arrested for murder.

Jesus Christ.

[joshdawg]

25. " was partly blamed for Eric Garner's death in police custody in 2014 "

"partly" to blame???!? Seriously? He was the blame, all his, no one else's.
And he gets "fired?" He should have his own jail cell. Period!

[BumRushDaShow]

26. I think the "partly to blame" was in reference to "policies" too like the idiotic "Stop and Frisk"

which I call "stalk and harass", where these types of confrontations inevitably lead to some sort of instigation that nefarious LEO would then use to justify going on a 'roid rage, and everything goes downhill from there. I.e., purposely causing pain to the person they are searching and then when the person involuntarily reacts to the pain, they are accused of "resisting", which in turn is used to justify initiating more pain or even death because "they resisted".

[joshdawg]

27. If panteleo was the one who had the choke hold

on Garner, then he was solely responsible and not just partly.
But, yes, I agree with your assessment about the "policies."

[BumRushDaShow]

28. I agree

I think the article phrasing was unclear in that it should have clarified that the reference was to the types of policies that lead up to why the encounter may have actually occurred in the first place, and distinguished that from the clearly illegal and deadly result by a rogue officer, while other officers participated in the incapacitation.