New video footage shows several police officers piled over the body of a young African-American man, who died on March 6 asphyxiated in police custody. Irvo Otieno, 28, died while waiting in a ward at Virginia State Central Hospital, where he was sent from a Henrico County jail.
Surveillance cameras recorded Otieno, handcuffed and shackled on his legs, being escorted to the admission room of the health center, located in County Dinwiddie, at 16.19 local time (20.19 GMT) on March 6.
The nine minutes of video posted on the Washington Post's website were a portion of the 27 minutes of footage the newspaper obtained thanks to court leaks. Dinwiddie County Commonwealth Prosecutor Ann Cabell Baskervil Baskervill has said full video of the incident would be released this week.
The recording shows how the young man is forced to lie on the ground by the agents and, ten minutes later, after he stood on his side with three people holding him, more agents and health workers come to immobilize him. Sometimes up to 10 agents and hospital workers hold him down.
Otieno is placed on his back, where several policemen seem to hold him with their knees and an officer grabs his head by grabbing his braided hair.
After 12 minutes immobilized, an agent is seen trying to take his pulse, but Otieno does not respond and three minutes try to revive him.
On Thursday, three hospital workers were charged in Otieno's death, joining seven deputies from the Henrico Sheriff's Office who were arrested and charged with second-degree murder.
Otieno had been arrested and placed in emergency custody, used with individuals who may have a mental illness, after being charged with assaulting a Henrico County police officer on March 3, local authorities said.
The day after he was arrested, Otieno was taken to the state hospital, where he later died. A preliminary report by medical examiners revealed that Otieno, who immigrated to the United States from Kenya when he was four, died of asphyxiation. The officers claimed that they had restrained him during the admission process because he was "combative." Authorities have not ruled out further charges or arrests.
The case of this young African-American comes just over two months after the death of Tyre Nichols, a black man who died from a police beating in Memphis, causing strong outrage across the country.
The US police have been accused by human rights organizations of using violence disproportionately towards the black population in the country.
Nearly one-third of all people killed by police in the U.S. in 2021 were African-Americans, despite being only 13 percent of the nation's population, according to Mapping Police Violence.
According to The Trust Project criteria
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