Eric Garner chokehold death

The New York Police Department and an independent agency tasked with investigating excessive force claims are inconsistent in determining how and when officers are held accountable for using prohibited chokeholds, according to a report being released Monday by the city's new inspector general for police.Two months after a grand jury declined to press criminal charges in the police killing of an unarmed New York City man, a state judge must decide whether to disclose details of the secret proceedings.

The New York Civil Liberties Union and other petitioners have gone to court on Staten Island to demand that Judge William Garnett open the record in the Eric Garner case — a position opposed by Richmond County District Attorney Daniel Donovan. Garnett is set to hear arguments at a hearing on Thursday morning.

In court papers, the NYCLU cited the outcry over the grand jury's decision not to indict Daniel Pantaleo — the white New York Police Department officer seen on a widely watched video putting the unarmed black man in what the medical examiner called a fatal chokehold — as a compelling reason to make an exception to the long-standing practice of keeping the process secret. (AP)


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