Eric Garner: 43 years old 

Favorite group: The Force M.D.s 

Favorite color: red

Eric Garner was a New York man who married his childhood sweetheart and had six children. Eric had worked as a mechanic, a bouncer and a horticulturist for the New York Department of Parks and Recreation. Unfortunately, he had asthma and had to quit his horticulturist job due to health reasons. On July 17, 2014, Garner is seen on video saying "I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe,” as a Staten Island police officer placed him in a deadly and illegal chokehold, in an attempt to arrest him for allegedly selling single cigarettes. 

Even when the medical examiner ruled Eric’s death a “homicide,” and the video clearly demonstrated use of the forbidden chokehold being applied, the white police officer was not indicted and it took another five years for the police department to fire him. This unjustified use of force ignited protests around the globe with protestors and the Black Lives Matter movement using the pleas of “I can’t breathe” as a powerful slogan. 

In 2015, New York City settled a "pre-litigation claim" with Eric Garner’s estate for $5.9 million. In June of 2020, the New York State Assembly passed and the Governor signed into law the "Eric Garner Anti-Chokehold Act," which establishes criminal penalties for the use of a chokehold by police officers. 

After his death, Eric’s family founded the E.R.I.C. Initiative Foundation, a social justice non-profit organization dedicated to eradicating systemic mistreatment of marginalized communities.