Tennessee Cops Mocked Dying Man’s Plea: ‘I Can’t Breathe.’

Tennessee cops were charged with civil rights abuse after new footage surfaced and showed how two police officers pinned down an inmate, which resulted in his death.

In the suit filed against the officers, the video is the major part of the civil rights suit.

The victim was an inmate who died after he was out of breath some minutes after the cops held him in the position with his face down with one of the officers joking, “You shouldn’t be able to breathe.”

William Jennette, 48, was seen in the new footage pinned down and tied more than a year ago.

“Help me,” he asked the other official at Marshall County Jail in Lewisburg, “they’re going to kill me.”

Asphyxia was recorded as “a contributory cause of death,” related to Tennessee cops member use of prone restraint.

Mr. Jennette’s post-mortem analysis was reported as a homicide, with “acute combined drug intoxication,” and the medical examiner also includes this as a cause of death.

The ‘prone restraint’ is currently being scrutinized after the police murder of George Floyd, a black-American man in Minneapolis, Minnesota, last year.

Mr. Jennette’s daughter filed a federal civil rights suit against law enforcement practice. The lawsuit bears the name of seven Tennessee cops as a defendant. The family of Jennette claims that harsh force was used at the jailhouse.

Mr. Jennette, the father of five children, was reported dead on 6 May 2020.

“All he wanted was help, and all he got was hate,” his daughter Cali Jennette told local CBS affiliate WTVF-TV.

He was pinned down while bearing an official’s weight on his back for the span that lasted four minutes, as stated in the lawsuit.

Tennessee cops have defended their stand; they said Mr. Jennette was “extremely unruly.”

A day before his death, He had his head repeatedly banged into the wall, say the Tennessee cops, which prompted them to put him in a  restraint chair.

This happened again on the day of his death; the cops say that he suddenly started banging his fists on the door, and when he was approached to be placed on a restraint chair as it was the previous day, he did not comply.

The father of five can be heard on the video saying Help me; they’re going to kill me.” During the act of struggle, Marshall County officers handcuffed him and forced him to the ground.

Tennessee cops rested their weight on his back, keeping their weight in him after he pleaded three times that he could not breathe.

One deputy answer: “You shouldn’t be able to breathe, you stupid little [expletive].”

The lawsuit claims that she then mocked Mr. Jennette by saying: “I can’t breathe.” Another officer allegedly laughed.

At the point in the footage that an official raises awareness about the dangers of “positional asphyxiation” and implores others to let him breathe.

The leg’s suit claims that at the period that the Tennessee cops turned over Mr. Jennette, his body was ” purple and lifeless.”