Although notice on cigarette packs warn that smoking the sticks can cause mouth and throat cancer, in addition to being a leading cause of death, African Americans Eric Garner and George Floyd would perish via police brutalities albeit with a cigarette connection.
Despite using the chokehold technique which the department had banned more than two decades before, the white police officer was suspended with pay and only fired when pressure mounted but a grand jury declined to indict him on criminal charges.
If Garner’s “I can’t breathe” last words rallied the Black Lives Matter protesters demanding police reform, the killing of 46-year-old Floyd on May 25, 2020, would energize the movement protest across the 50 states of the U.S.
Floyd was pulled from his car, handcuffed and then pinned beneath three police officers making him unable to breathe and not even the pleas of onlookers would make officer Derek Chauvin lift his knee off Floyd’s neck.
The day after Floyd’s death, the Police Department fired all four of the officers involved in the episode.
