Trial Date Set For NYPD Cop Who Choked Eric Garner

NEW YORK — The disciplinary trial for the NYPD cop who choked Eric Garner will finally start nearly five years after the Staten Island man's death. Deputy Commissioner of Trials Rosemarie Maldonado on Thursday set a May 13 start date for Officer Daniel Pantaleo's internal trial, which could lead to his termination from the force.

Pantaleo reportedly appeared at NYPD headquarters Thursday for an initial conference in the case four years and three days after a Staten Island grand jury declined to indict him.

Prosecutors from the Civilian Complaint Review Board, the city's independent police oversight agency, will bring evidence to prove Pantaleo used "excessive and unnecessary" force in Garner's July 2014 death, said CCRB Chair Fred Davie.

"For justice for Eric Garner and for every New Yorker whose faith in our police department we must fight to enhance — our prosecutors stand ready to prosecute Officer Pantaleo," Davie said in a statement.

The NYPD said it would move to discipline Pantaleo in July after waiting nearly four years for the U.S. Department of Justice to wrap up its own inquiry into the incident, which still has not happened.

Pantaleo's lawyer, Stuart London, said he wanted to push back the start of the trial to July, after the deadline for federal prosecutors to bring civil rights charges against the officer.

A medical expert will show Pantaleo did not use a chokehold and did not have his arm around Garner's neck when he indicated he couldn't breathe, London said.

The head of the city's largest police union alleged that the process was being rushed because of "noise" from outside activists.

"We're having a trial in front of a kangaroo court," said Patrick Lynch, the president of the NYPD Patrolmen's Benevolent Association. "... We need to slow down, let the evidence speak for itself and allow this police officer to go on with his career."

Protesters tried to drown out Lynch and London as they addressed reporters outside police headquarters, chanting "No justice, no peace" and "Pantaleo has got to go."

Police-reform activists argued the officer has already gone too long without facing accountability for Garner's death. Garner's mother, Gwen Carr, said she would have liked trial to start earlier.

"It’s been four and a half years with no justice," she said.

Cellphone video captured Pantaleo wrapping his arm around Garner's neck on July 17, 2014 as cops tried to arrest him for selling untaxed cigarettes. Garner, 43, could be heard shouting "I can't breathe" as cops held him to the ground, a phrase that became a rallying cry for the Black Lives Matter movement.

Carr and other activists want the NYPD to ultimately fire all the officers involved in Garner's death. The Police Department will be proceeding with a case against Sgt. Kizzy Adonis, who was a supervising officer on the scene, a police spokesman said.

"Who’s on trial here is not just Pantaleo," the Rev. Al Sharpton said. "It’s the New York City Police Department and whether it will enforce and stand up to its own policies and its own laws."

Pantaleo is currently assigned to a desk job in Staten Island. Carr was present for Thursday's proceedings at One Police Plaza, which she said was the first time she had been in a room with the cop.

"I felt sort of numb being in the same space with my son’s murderer," she said.

Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated the exact length of time between the Staten Island grand jury's decision and the initial conference in Pantaleo's disciplinary case. It was four years and three days, not four years and two days.

(Lead image: Gwen Carr, Eric Garner's mother, appears Thursday after an initial conference in the disciplinary case against Officer Daniel Pantaleo. Photo by Julio Cortez/Associated Press)