Man Begs for Help, Telling Guards He Can't Breathe, Before Dying in Jail

Video footage was recently released, showing the final moments of Michael Sabbie's life before he died in Bi State Jail earlier this year. The 35-year-old father of four was in custody for 48-hours on a domestic assault charge and he was pepper-sprayed by guards, which seemed to trigger a severe reaction. He repeatedly begged the guards to get him help, as he told them, "I can't breathe, sir. Please! Please!"

The guards seemingly thought Sabbie was faking his reaction and he was laid on the cell floor overnight. The following morning he was found dead, and his death was initially ruled as "natural" by a medical examiner.

Erik J. Heipt, an attorney representing the Sabbie family, is bringing up the video as evidence that Michael possibly died as a result of the pepper spray incident. "If you just looked at the cause of death, you would think that Michael died of some sort of hypertensive heart condition, and that may be true. But if we didn't have a video, we'd never know that he had been begging for help due to his shortness of breath and inability to breathe. We'd never know that he said 'I can't breathe' 19 times in the nine minutes that we hear in that video."

Source: The Huffington Post