The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office in California announced charges on Thursday against three City of Alameda police officers for involuntary manslaughter of detainee Mario Gonzalez.

On April 19, 2021, the officers tried to detain Gonzalez after receiving “a call involving a man behaving oddly in a public park”. They later learned he was a suspect in a shoplifting incident. Body-cam footage reviewed by JURIST shows the officers struggling to handcuff Gonzalez, forcing him to the ground and holding him there for minutes. Gonzalez then died at the scene.

An initial investigation did not find any police misconduct. The autopsy pointed to methamphetamine as the cause of death, with stress from the restraint, obesity and alcoholism as contributing factors. But the District Attorney’s Office reopened the case later, and a second autopsy pointed to asphyxiation from the restraint as the cause of death.

The District Attorney’s Office charged the officers with involuntary manslaughter under section 192(b) of the California Penal Code. That statute criminalizes “the unlawful killing of a human being without malice … in the commission of a lawful act which might product death, in an unlawful manner, or without due caution and circumspection.” That means the prosecutors need to prove that the officers were negligent in restraining Gonzalez and that the restraint caused his death.

News reporters have compared the series of events to the death of George Floyd in 2020. In that case, a jury found former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin guilty of murder and manslaughter. California has previously sought to address police misconduct in Los Angeles and to better hold police officers accountable.