Graham Nash Gives Money To Man Who Filmed Eric Garner Chokehold

NEW YORK — The famed singer-songwriter Graham Nash has thrown his support behind the imprisoned man who showed the world how Eric Garner was put in a chokehold five years ago.

Nash recently gave money to an online fundraiser supporting Ramsey Orta, who has alleged that the NYPD retaliated against him for filming Garner's fatal July 2014 encounter with officers.

The former Crosby, Stills & Nash member said he wants to make more people aware of what has happened to Orta, who is currently serving a four-year state prison sentence on drug and weapon charges. In Nash's eyes, the 27-year-old Staten Islander "bravely put his own safety and life in jeopardy by filming the murder of his friend."

"We owe Ramsey Orta a great deal as a nation," Nash, 77, told Patch in an email. "His courageous action which he is now being punished for each day, is the reason we know what really happened to Eric Garner."

Nash encouraged his more than 316,000 Facebook followers on Monday to donate to the campaign aiming to support Orta upon his release. The effort had raised nearly $3,200 in seven days as of late Thursday afternoon.

Nash declined to tell Patch the amount of money he contributed: "It's not important how much I donated," he said. "It's just important that I did."

In addition to his financial support, Nash said he and his wife penned letters of support to Orta and wrote to the state parole board to urge his early release. The board denied Orta parole on Aug. 14, state records show.

Orta's supporters have argued that he's being unjustly punished for filming the events that led to Garner's death while the officer who choked him, Daniel Pantaleo, has gone free.

Video from the scene on Bay Street sparked widespread outrage and was used in the U.S. Department of Justice's lengthy investigation of Garner's death. Orta also reportedly testified in Pantaleo's NYPD disciplinary trial this year, which led to the cop's firing on Aug. 19. Pantaleo has not faced criminal charges.

According to news reports, Orta has accused the NYPD in lawsuits of arresting him as revenge for shooting the infamous footage in which Garner can be heard gasping "I can't breathe," which became a rallying cry for the Black Lives Matter movement. The city has reportedly denied any wrongdoing.

Orta was sentenced to four years behind bars in October 2016 after pleading guilty to charges of criminal possession of a weapon and criminal sale of a controlled substance stemming from separate arrests in August 2014 and January 2015, according to news reports and state records.

Nash said he learned about Orta from his wife, the photographer Amy Grantham, who has closely followed his case. Nash was moved to speak out about Orta's plight after reading an article about him in the online publication The Verge, he said.

Grantham has "spoken out a lot about him on her social media account but we both felt that we could hopefully reach more people, and make more people aware of what is happening to Ramsey if I spoke out as well," Nash told Patch.

The modest contributions to Orta's fundraiser stand in contrast to a GoFundMe campaign for Pantaleo, which had raked in more than $162,000 as of Thursday.

Orta's supporters have nonetheless welcomed the signal boost from Nash, a Grammy Award winner who has twice been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The Support Ramsey Orta Facebook page thanked Nash and Grantham "for amplifying the injustice Ramsey has been facing."

Andrew Plasse, Orta’s attorney, said he was “overjoyed that someone of that stature with a history of supporting just causes would take Ramsey’s side.”