DOJ Shakes Up Team Investigating Chokehold Death Case

In a highly unusual move, the Department of Justice has replaced the team of agents and lawyers investigating the death of Eric Garner. In 2014, Garner was accused by police officers of selling untaxed cigarettes. In a video of the confrontation, one of the officers is shown subduing Garner with a chokehold, prohibited by the New York Police Department. Garner is heard on the video saying, “I can’t breathe,” before dying. Federal authorities have been investigating the fatal police encounter, but that process was slowed by federal prosecutors and FBI officials in New York who are opposed to bringing charges in the case. Prosecutors in the Civil Rights Division at DOJ in Washington were in favor of bringing charges. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch replaced the Brooklyn federal prosecutors with individuals from outside New York, the New York Times reports. Stuart London, who represents Daniel Pantaleo, the officer who deployed the chokehold, said: “If it is true that the Justice Department is rejecting the recommendations of seasoned FBI agents and assistant United States attorneys, this is a gross miscarriage of justice. In our system of justice, politics should never take the place of the rule of law.”