May 21, 2021- 6:41 p.m.
A man who died after being pinned to the floor by law enforcement at a Tennessee jail last year repeatedly told officers he couldn’t breathe, according to video obtained by reports. But officers continued to restrain the man after he was prone and handcuffed, a federal civil rights lawsuit alleges, and after he pleaded that he couldn’t breathe, a deputy responded: “You shouldn’t be able to breathe, you stupid [expletive.]”
The lawsuit filed by the family of 48-year-old William Jennette says Marshall County deputies and Lewisburg police officers used excessive force against Jennette during the restraint at the Marshall County jail in Lewisburg, Tennessee. The suit alleges that Jennette wasn’t resisting and law enforcement should have been trained about the well-known deadly dangers of asphyxiation associated with prone restraint.Â
“All he wanted was help and all he got was hate. It’s not right,” Jennette’s daughter, Calli Jennette, told the station.
Lewisburg Mayor Jim Bingham said in a statement that Jennette “became extremely unruly, being both verbally and physically abusive” with deputies assigned to work at the jail. He said the deputies called Lewisburg police officers to respond “due to Mr. Jennette’s aggressive behavior and refusal to comply with commands to stop physically resisting.” The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation probed the death and closed the investigation several months later, he said.Bingham called Jennette’s death “unfortunate” and said he could not comment further because of the pending lawsuit. Â
An autopsy cites Jennette’s cause of death as acute combined drug intoxication from methamphetamine and an antihistamine, and lists asphyxiation as a contributing factor. It says Jennette, who was White, was “subdued and restrained by officers during struggle while under the influence,” and lists the manner of death as a homicide.
The family lawsuit, however, alleges Jennette died because of beating and suffocation at the hands of the deputies and officers involved, who “caused extreme, almost unfathomable, pain and suffering to Mr. Jennette prior to his death.”
