In a new racist crime, a US citizen of African origin died after being suffocated to death while in police custody 

Washington (ST) – A video, published Tuesday evening, showed the death of a 28-year-old American youth of African origin at the hands of the police while he was admitted to a mental hospital. 

The Washington Post published the 9-minutes recording from the hospital’s surveillance camera that recorded the incident. In the video, 28-year-old Ervo Otieno was handcuffed and ankle shackled on March 6 Virginia Central State Hospital. The footage shows officers dragging the youth Ervo Otieno into the entrance hall and forcing him to the floor, where they restrain him at 4.28pm.

Twelve minutes later, at 4.40 p.m., Mr. Otieno appears unresponsive with chest compressions starting two minutes later.

The American police arrested Otieno on March 3 after he suffered a psychological crisis, and after being detained for three days in the local prison, he was transferred to the central hospital in the state, where he died.

This incident sheds light again on the tragedies of a number of African Americans who were killed or injured during their arrest by the police, as happened in the killing of George Floyd, whose death in 2020 under the knee of a policeman in Minneapolis shocked the world and led to numerous demonstrations to denounce racism and brutality practiced by the American police.

Najla Khoury