Protests have erupted in Schenectady, New York after a police officer knelt on the neck of a Guyanese man who was being questioned in connection with an act of vandalism.
A now viral nine-minute video shows Yugeshwar Gaindarpersaud, 31, being detained by the unidentified officer while his mother screams in the background and his father Jaindra demands that he be released.
The incident occurred on Monday morning less than a month after Gover-nor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Gary McCarthy each signed executive orders explicitly banning the use of knee-to-neck and choke holds by the city’s police department. The orders were a direct response to countrywide protests after American George Floyd was killed by a similar knee hold.
