Black Milwaukee man died begging for help while pinned down by hotel employees as family demands charges

A black man died begging for help while he was pinned down by security guards outside a Milwaukee hotel — in a case that is drawing comparisons to the 2020 death of George Floyd , his family says.

D’Vontaye Mitchell, 43, was pronounced dead after four security guards were filmed holding him down on his stomach during a struggle outside the Hyatt Regency back on June 30, according to cops and witness videos.

Police, who are probing his death as a homicide, have said the ordeal unfolded after Mitchell entered the hotel, caused some type of disturbance and then fought with the guards as they were trying to escort him out.

His family, however, is demanding criminal charges be filed after reviewing hotel surveillance video Wednesday that they allege showed the guards chasing Mitchell inside the hotel and then dragging him outside, where he was beaten.

“It makes me sick to my stomach,” DeAsia Harmon, Mitchell’s widow, said during a Wednesday news conference as she described what she saw on the surveillance videos as “disgusting.”

“He ran for his life. He was trying to leave. He said, ‘I’ll go,’ and they didn’t let him go.”

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Several witness videos have also emerged in the aftermath, according to his family and their lawyers — including one where a bleeding Mitchell can be heard grunting and shouting out apologies as he was pinned to the ground.

“In the video, you see them with their knees on his back and neck,” said famed civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Mitchell’s family.

“You see them pull his shirt over his head, stifling not only his sound but, we believe, his breath.”

Crump added that they have since obtained a signed affidavit from a hotel staffer who alleged a security guard struck Mitchell with a baton at one point during the struggle.

The staffer alleged that a guard had also ordered him and a bellman to help hold Mitchell down in the aftermath, Crump said.

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A spokesperson for Aimbridge Hospitality, which runs the Hyatt Regency in Milwaukee, said in a statement that it extends its condolences to Mitchell’s family and that multiple employees involved in the incident had since been fired.

“The conduct we saw from several associates on June 30 violated our policies and procedures, and does not reflect our values as an organization or the behaviors we expect from our associates,” the spokesperson said.

“Following review of their actions, their employment has been terminated. We will continue our independent investigation and do everything we can to support law enforcement with their investigation into this tragic incident.”

The rep didn’t say how many employees had been fired or what their positions were.

It wasn’t immediately clear why Mitchell — who relatives say had mental health issues — was at the hotel, or what disturbance happened prior to the guards pinning him down.

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The medical examiner’s office has already said Mitchell’s preliminary cause of death was homicide, but stressed the official cause is still under investigation.

No one has been criminally charged so far and the district attorney’s office said Wednesday that it was awaiting the full autopsy results.

Meanwhile, Crump — who also represented the family of George Floyd after he was killed by a white police officer in Minneapolis — said the Mitchell family would demand “justice every day this week, every day next week and every day after that.”

“Everybody in America, after George Floyd, should have trained their employees, especially security personnel, to not put knees on people’s backs and people’s necks,” Crump said.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist James E. Casey emphasized the similarities between the two men’s deaths.

“The deaths are tragically similar and follow a sickeningly familiar template,” he wrote . “In the midst of dealing with unfathomable losses, families are forced to plead for justice even in the face of incontrovertible video evidence.”

Mitchell’s funeral will take place Thursday when the Rev. Al Sharpton, a longtime activist and leader who serves on the US Commission on Civil Rights, will address mourners.

With Post wires

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