WARNING: This story contains graphic video and audio captured during violent police interventions.
In a back alley snuggled between rows of apartment buildings in northeast Montreal, a group of family members are huddled for a vigil and a prayer.
“Justice for the life of Abisay,” said a woman, with her hands raised and eyes closed during a prayer in Spanish, referring to Abisay Cruz, a relative of hers who died on March 30 after an intervention by Montreal police turned violent.
Two floors up from a fire escape just steps away, Cruz’s grieving mother, Marcelina Isidro, sat on her balcony overlooking the group prayer — the same balcony where her son could be heard yelling “Je vais mourir,” or “I’m going to die,” in video footage that captured part of his altercation with police.
“What happened is very difficult,” Isidro told CBC News in Spanish. “I never thought my son would leave us, that my son would die so young.”
Sunday’s vigil in the Montreal neighbourhood of Saint-Michel took place on the fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, which galvanized the Black Lives Matter movement and sparked protests around the world about police brutality and racism.
The people at the vigil point to the fact that, similar to how Cruz could be heard yelling that he was going to die, Floyd could be heard saying “I can’t breathe” as police officer Derek Chauvin used his knee to pin Floyd’s neck to the pavement for more than nine minutes.
“It was the same situation with my brother. Someone who was asking for help, who couldn’t breathe,” said Josué Cruz, Abisay’s younger brother.
“And even then they just continued to put pressure on his back.”
Cruz was 29 years old. His only child, Enzo, is nine.
Cruz was one of two people in the Montreal area who died after a police intervention in a span of about 12 hours that weekend in late March. Quebec’s police watchdog, the Bureau des enquêtes indépendantes (BEI), is investigating.
According to the preliminary information the BEI released at the time, Montreal police responded to a 911 call on March 30 about a person in crisis near the corner of Pie-IX Boulevard and 47th Street.
After police arrived and an altercation occurred between them and a man at the scene, the officers eventually restrained him. The BEI said the man, who was later identified as Cruz, suffered “malaise” and lost consciousness. He was given first-aid and transported to hospital where he was declared dead.
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Since then, videos that captured the police intervention have circulated, including footage that was released by the family about three weeks after Cruz’s death.
“We think that there are similarities in the ways that Mr. Cruz died and the way Mr. Floyd died,” said Fo Niemi, the head of the Center for Research-Action on Race Relations (CRARR).
“This is an opportunity to show that George Floyd can happen here in Montreal.”
Videos of the police altercation with Cruz show two officers restraining the 29-year-old father on the back balcony of the apartment where he lived with his mother.
Cruz is face down on his stomach and the officers are kneeling. It’s not clear if they’re kneeling on or beside him.
At one point, however, Cruz’s legs appear to be thrashing against the balcony and he’s clearly in distress. Another video from a different angle shared on social media picks up events a little later. In this video, Cruz can be seen struggling while an officer is clearly kneeling on his back.
The family has called for a public coroner’s inquiry. The coroner’s office hasn’t ruled that out yet.
Montreal police declined CBC News’s request for comment, citing the ongoing BEI investigation.
Cristian Bermudez was best friends with Cruz.
He lived two apartment buildings away from him and they spent much of their childhood in the alley where people gathered for Sunday’s vigil.
“He was a loving guy. He was there for his friends — loyal,” said Bermudez. “It’s hard for everybody. It’s been very hard, especially the way that he went out.”
Cruz’s younger brother, Josué, said interactions between police and Black, Arab and Latino people in the Saint-Michel neighbourhood can often get tense and he maintains that his brother would still be alive if he were white.
“The arrest would’ve unfolded differently,” he said.
Josué added that the grieving process has been difficult because the family doesn’t have answers to its questions about what happened that day.
He thinks the public gatherings and protests in his brother’s honour will continue as long as that continues to be the case.
“Even his son is asking questions, and he doesn’t have answers,” said Josué.
“He’s asking things like whether police are actually there to help.”
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