NEW YORK, December 4 (Sputnik) – A religious group has called for "urgent reforms" in the New York police force after a grand jury decision to not bring charges against a police officer who killed African-American Eric Garner in a chokehold earlier this year.
"This and other similar cases nationwide point to the urgent need for reforms in police procedures and training," Sadyia Khalique from the Council on American-Islamic Relations said in a statement Wednesday after the grand jury decision.
"Along with other New Yorkers, we are dismayed that the grand jury chose to not allow an open trial for an officer, who allegedly took actions that resulted in the death of an unarmed person who posed no threat to anyone," Khalique's statement added.
Protesters rallied in Times Square and Staten Island after the decision was announced, calling for a public trial, rather than a grand jury process that occurs behind closed doors.
Expecting potential protests following the jury's decision on Garner, New York City Mayor urged NYC residents to protest peacefully.
Garner was a street peddler, selling untaxed cigarettes. A nearly 350-pound asthmatic, he died from suffocation after being put in a chokehold by police officer Daniel Pantaleo in July. A video of the arrest and chokehold was recorded by a bystander with a cell-phone and went viral on the internet.
Wednesday's grand jury decision on Garner follows another similar case in Ferguson, Missouri, where African-American teenager Michael Brown was killed by a while police officer in August. That killing and a verdict by a grand jury not to indict officer Darren Wilson last week set off nationwide protests and renewed debate over police brutality in the United States.
