A court in the North American state of North Carolina has ordered the dissemination of a video with images of the last moments of a black citizen who died in custody in a state correctional facility, and for whose death five workers of the center have been charged. .
The individual has been identified as John Elliott Neville, 56, of Greensboro. The images capture a syncope he suffered a day after his arrest on December 1, 2019, reduced by correctional staff, five officers and a paramedic, as he yelled “I can’t breathe!” and “Mom!”
These screams are part of the collective imagination of Americans as they are the same as those proclaimed by the also black citizen George Floyd, whose death in police custody in March, for which a police officer was charged with murder, caused the largest protests in recent United States history.
Neville, arrested for assaulting a woman, suffered the episode after falling from his bunk. In the middle of the attack, those responsible for the center tried to reduce him and placed a white sack on his head to protect himself from his saliva, given the possibility that he suffered from coronavirus.
Those responsible for the center immobilized him until they managed to take him away in a wheelchair for observation. During the move, Neville declares that he is “ill” and cannot handle himself.
The six implicated have been indicted for involuntary manslaughter and fired from work, as explained by the Forsyth district attorney, Jim O’Neill. County Sheriff Bobby Kimbrough Jr. apologized to the family of the deceased following the release of the video.
