The charge against Christopher Smelser, 29, was dropped by Judge Douglas Driggers via a directed verdict after half an hour of arguments.
The New York State Supreme Court has ruled a state law banning "chokeholds" may take now effect, potentially permanently removing that tactic from an officer's available inventory of arrest-and-control techniques.
The law, passed by the City Council in the wake of George Floyd’s in-custody death, made it possible for officers to be charged with a misdemeanor crime if they do anything during an arrest that restricts a person’s breathing “in any way.”
David Afanador was cleared of criminal strangulation charges Tuesday nearly 15 months after cell phone video went viral capturing the arrest of 35-year-old Ricky Bellevue on the Rockaway boardwalk on June 21, 2020.
Under the new policy, the department’s law enforcement components will be prohibited from using “chokeholds” and “carotid restraints” unless deadly force is authorized, that is “when the officer has a reasonable belief that the subject of such force poses an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to the officer or to another person.”
Missouri police officers would be prohibited from using chokeholds to subdue crime suspects under a sweeping package of law enforcement reforms that were expected to be signed into law by Gov. Mike Parson on Wednesday.
While working on the policy, law enforcement officials decided to ask legislators to amend the chokehold ban to make it clear that police can use chokeholds to defend themselves in life-and-death situations.
The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which would ban chokeholds, require that deadly force only be used as a last resort in arrests, and effectively end qualified immunity.
Cariol Horne, a former Buffalo police officer, was fired, faced departmental charges and left without a pension after the 2006 incident
The bill would ban all neck restraints, including chokeholds and the kind used on Floyd as well as no-knock warrants in drug cases. It would also end the application of the doctrine of qualified immunity for law enforcement officers.
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