Prosecutors overseeing a grand jury investigation into Daniel Prude’s death last year in Rochester, New York, filed the case on criminal charges with the testimony of a medical expert who said three police officers who they kept Prude on the ground until he stopped breathing they didn’t make him do anything wrong.
Dr. Gary Vilke told the grand jury that Prude, a 41-year-old black man, died of a heart attack caused by the medical phenomenon known as excited delirium. He said the officers’ actions, which included placing a mesh hood over Prude’s head, did not affect his breathing, according to transcripts released Friday.
A forensic doctor ruled Prude’s death a homicide by asphyxiation by physical restraint, with the use of the drug PCP as a factor.
Vilke, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, who routinely testifies on behalf of police, said containing Prude during the early March 23, 2020 meeting may have been best for his security given its status.
Asked by a grand jury if anything could be done better, Vilke replied, “I wouldn’t do anything different.”
The grand jury eventually dismissed the charges of criminal negligence homicide against the three officers with a 15-5 vote, according to transcripts.
Prosecutors at the state attorney general’s office did not ask for any other charges. They told grand jurors that they could choose not to charge if they believed the use of force was justified. Five jurors indicated they would have voted to charge at least one of the officers.
The grand jury’s decision not to charge was announced at the time it was made in February, but nine-day transcripts of eyewitness accounts, including Prude’s brother, police officers, and experts, offer a rare window into a process that usually stays wrapped up.
The Prude family’s attorney, Elliot Shields, said he believed prosecutors had undermined his own case by calling Vilke, whom he compared to a defense witness.
“Obviously they didn’t even try,” Shields told The Associated Press.
“They hired him to come in and they could have coverage and say,‘ Well, we tried. ’Well no, you didn’t,” Shields said. “You tried to make sure these agents withdrew from the neckline.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James had said, in announcing the grand jury’s decision, that the state had put in the best case it could.
His office defended his use of Vilke as an expert on Friday, saying he promised an independent investigation without a predetermined outcome.
The release of materials from the grand jury comes at a sensitive time for the issue of race in the police. The testimony ends with the trial of former Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd. And on Thursday, a video of the body camera showing a Chicago police officer was released fatally shot 13-year-old Adam Toledo last month, after he seemed to throw a gun and start raising his hands.
Prude met with police hours after he was released from a hospital after a mental health arrest. He ran naked from his brother’s house and was seen covering shop windows. Prude’s brother, Joe, testified that he warned an agent responding at his home, “Don’t kill my brother.”
Prude’s death went unnoticed until September, when her family posted a video with the body camera of the encounter obtained through a public registration application. Emails later posted by the city showed police commanders urging city officials to stop posting the images.
The video showed Prude handcuffed and naked with a hood spit on his head while one officer pushed his face against the ground and another officer pressed a knee to his back. Officers kept Prude ready for about two minutes until he stopped breathing. A week later he was removed from life support.
Vilke told the grand jury that drug use and mental illness contribute to aroused delirium, which can make people vulnerable to cardiac arrest. There is no universally accepted definition of excited delirium and researchers have said it is not well understood.
Vilke said he did not believe the spit-out bell was a factor or that officers were obstructing Prude’s breathing.
“So all of these things allow me to be comfortable saying that my view is that none of the agents, their impact, individual or collective, would have caused or contributed to this cardiac arrest,” Vilke said. “And, even taking it one step further, if he had been allowed to get up and run …, it would actually be more harmful than keeping him.”
Shields, the Prude family’s attorney, called Vilke’s claim that Prude was safer “outrageous.”
An officer stated that police used the hood because Prude spat and distrusted being ill during the early days of the pandemic.
“I don’t know if you remember exactly the coronavirus, how we felt, but it was almost hysteria in the country,” the unidentified officer said.
The state also offered the testimony of the grand jury of Geoffrey Alpert, a professor of criminology at the University of South Carolina, who previously worked as a federal monitor for the New Orleans police department.
Alpert also stated that the spitting bells do not restrict breathing. He said it was reasonable for officers to land Prude on the ground, considering it a generally safe method of containment.
But he said officers probably kept Prude in his stomach for an unreasonable amount of time, though he added that he was not a doctor and could not say whether this contributed to his death.
Images of Prude’s arrest and restraint sparked nightly protests in Rochester, a rust-strap town on the shores of Lake Ontario, which was recently razed by images from the body of white officers with pepper to a nine-year-old black girl.
James, whose office investigates police traits, obtained permission from a judge to make public the generally secret material of the grand jury, citing the desire for transparency in Prude’s case. The transcripts were published with the names of the witnesses turned off.
Seven officers, including the three involved in Prude’s restraint, remain suspended pending the outcome of an internal investigation.
Matthew Rich, a lawyer for four agents who responded but were not involved in Prude’s restraint, questioned the closed-door process that paved the way for the release of the transcripts. Despite this, he wrote in a letter to the judge last month that he and his clients “have nothing to hide.”
A grand jury of Prude praised the “amazing work” of the tax team.
“If it weren’t for everything you presented to us, I don’t think anyone would have made a decision. You worked very hard and I’m sure no one took it lightly, “said the jury. “It was a very serious case. It’s horrible what happened to him. “
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Associated Press reporters Larry Neumeister, Thalia Beaty, Jennifer Peltz, Jim Mustian and David B. Caruso in New York; Carolyn Thompson in Buffalo and Michael Hill in Albany contributed to this report.
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Follow Michael Sisak on Twitter at twitter.com/mikesisak