Eric Garner remembered on the 10th anniversary of his chokehold death, echoing his last words, “I can’t breathe.”

Wednesday marks a decade since Eric Garner’s death at the hands of New York City police, which turned his final words, “I can’t breathe,” into a powerful rallying cry. Bystander footage captured Garner gasping for air while being restrained in a police chokehold, igniting protests under the Black Lives Matter movement in New York and nationwide. These demonstrations intensified following the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old Black man, by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, in August 2014.

Six years later, George Floyd’s death under similar circumstances reignited mass protests, as he, too, uttered “I can’t breathe” while a Minneapolis officer knelt on his neck. On the anniversary of her son’s death, Gwen Carr, Garner’s mother, plans to lead a march on Staten Island, the site of the incident. Carr remains committed to keeping Garner’s memory alive and fighting for justice.

Garner, a Black man, was restrained by Officer Daniel Pantaleo, who is white. As they struggled on the ground, Garner repeatedly gasped for air before losing consciousness and later being pronounced dead at a hospital. An investigation determined that Pantaleo had used a chokehold prohibited by the NYPD since the 1990s, and the city’s medical examiner classified Garner’s death as a homicide. Despite this, no criminal charges were filed against Pantaleo or the officers present.

In 2019, Richard Donoghue, then U.S. attorney for Brooklyn, explained the difficulty in proving that Pantaleo acted willfully in violating the law, leading to the decision not to pursue federal civil rights charges. Pantaleo was fired later that year following a police disciplinary process.

Garner’s family received $5.9 million in a lawsuit against the city but continued their quest for justice with a judicial inquiry into his death in 2021. This inquiry, held virtually due to the pandemic, aimed to create an official record rather than assign blame.

One of the family’s attorneys was Alvin Bragg, who later became Manhattan’s district attorney. Bragg commended Carr and Garner’s family for their resilience, expressing his determination to honor Garner’s legacy by striving for a safer and fairer city.

Mayor Eric Adams, who was Brooklyn borough president when Garner died, recalled the incident vividly, expressing hope that another situation like it never occurs again. The ongoing remembrance of Eric Garner highlights the enduring fight for justice and accountability in policing.