A police officer in Seattle, Washington, United States used the knee-to-neck tactic while arresting a white man. It was caught on tape by Seattle-based photographer Matt M. McKnight.
The white man was one of the people caught looting a T-Mobile store in downtown Seattle on May 31, 2020. The way he was arrested is reminiscent of the fatal arrest of the late African-American security guard George Floyd on May 25, 2020.
But there are many differences. The white looter is still alive while Floyd died more than an hour after former Minneapolis Police Department officer Derek Michael Chauvin used the knee-to-neck tactic while arresting him.
https://www.instagram.com/tv/CA20zjrFFOv/?utm_source=ig_embed
Also, Floyd had to endure 8 minutes and 46 seconds of suffocation while Chauvin was kneeling on his neck. The arresting officer ignored the suggestions of a colleague and the pleas of the bystanders to let the arrestee breathe.
In the case of the white looter in Seattle, the crowd kept screaming at the arresting officer from the Seattle Police Department to get his knee of the arrestee’s neck. A fellow cop who was handcuffing the white looter was quick to remove his colleague’s knee from arrestee’s neck.
While the U.S. is still battling against the new coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, more and more Americans are going out to protest against the fatal arrest of Floyd. Along with the protests are incidents of looting.
“This isn’t going to make that any easier,” Seattle Times quoted Downtown Seattle Association CEO Jon Scholes as saying. “It’s something we’ve just never seen in downtown Seattle.”
It appears that the looters are taking advantage of the time when businesses are closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the cops are busy dealing with the protesters. Watch the recent protests in Seattle here:
CONAN Daily 