Death of Man Who Fought With Deputies Investigated

Sheriff’s homicide detectives are investigating the death of a man who had fought with deputies and was found to have wads of paper in his throat, the sheriff’s department said Wednesday.

The 43-year-old man, whose name was not released, died at 4:40 a.m. Tuesday at Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center.

Deputies were sent to a home in the 400 block of East 130th Street on Monday after a woman reported that her son was drunk, “tearing up the house and behaving violently.”

Four deputies and two sergeants entered the home and said they found the man nude “and behaving in a bizarre manner.” They said he was cooperative at first, but then became combative.

He was shot with a dart from an electronic stun gun, but continued to “struggle and kick,” the department said. He was restrained with a nylon device known as a total appendage restraint procedure, said Deputy Boris Nikolof.

Deputies later noticed he was having trouble breathing. Paramedics pulled three wads of magazine pages from his throat, which he apparently had swallowed prior to the arrival of the deputies.