South Bay City Bans Controversial Neck Hold

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA – The Mountain View Police Department announced Monday it has discontinued the use of a controversial neck hold in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in police custody after a Minneapolis police officer applied a choke hold on him for more than eight minutes.

The South Bay city’s police department announced on Twitter Monday that it was banning the use of a “carotid hold.”

After further review, and in line w/ state recommendations, we have updated our policy to immediately discontinue the use of the carotid hold.

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After further review, and in line w/ state recommendations, we have updated our policy to immediately discontinue the use of the carotid hold.

We continue to review additional policies + have meaningful conversations w/ our MV community. As we have more to share, we will do so. pic.twitter.com/ewobMdgJgu
— Mountain View Police (@MountainViewPD) June 8, 2020

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The announcement cites “state recommendations” for banning the controversial technique.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday ordered the state’s police training agency to stop teaching carotid holds.

“We train techniques on strangleholds that put people’s lives at risk,” Newsom said Friday at a news conference, according to Cal Matters.

“At the end of the day, a carotid hold that literally is designed to stop people’s blood from flowing into their brain, that has no place any longer in 21st Century practices and policing.”

The Mountain View Police Department said in its statement that the carotid hold ban goes into effect immediately.

“After further review, and in line w/ state recommendations, we have updated our policy to immediately discontinue the use of the carotid hold. We continue to review additional policies + have meaningful conversations w/ our MV community. As we have more to share, we will do so."

The carotid restraint, in which an officer renders a person unconscious by applying pressure to a person’s vascular veins, cutting off blood flow to the brain, is different from a chokehold, in which pressure is applied to the neck and throat, cutting off air supply, USA Today reports.

The use of the carotid hold in law enforcement has a problematic history in California law enforcement.

The Los Angeles Police Commission restricted the carotid hold after a dozen black men died from the technique in police custody, according to a report in The Los Angeles Times.

Daryl Gates, the department’s controversial former chief, attributed the deaths of blacks from the carotid hold by saying that the “veins or arteries of blacks do not open up as fast as they do in normal people,” according to the report.