New police car dash camera video has been released in the death of Barbara Dawson. Dawson, 57, died last month of a blood clot after she collapsed on the ground after being removed from a Blountstown, Florida, hospital by police. The video, released by her family lawyers, does not show footage of her death but does capture audio of her final seconds, including her cries of “I can’t breathe.” ABC News reports:

Dawson had gone to the hospital seeking treatment for abdominal pain the night before, but an officer was called to the hospital after she had been discharged by medical staff who alleged she had become unruly and refused to leave, officials said. The officer then arrested Dawson and removed her from the hospital for "disorderly conduct and trespassing." [...] Though Dawson is not visible in most of the police interior dash-cam video, she can be heard repeatedly shouting "oh my God," and saying she "can't breathe" multiple times as Dawson is told that she's OK, "there's nothing wrong with you" and to "please stand up." The officer can be heard on the tape telling Dawson at one point, "We surely don’t want to hurt you ... but you are going go to jail one way or the other, OK? So you can help us ... or we can do it the hard way." An officer and hospital staff can be seen trying to lift her, now silent, into a police car as the dash-cam continues to roll inside.

Dawson died from health complications from the clot and her weight and there is no evidence of police brutality. However, the very act of forcibly removing a seriously overweight person who was obviously under health duress should itself be under scrutiny. Why do we continue to lean on calling the police for every single inconvenience? Was Dawson’s condition stabilized?

A police report indicates that it took almost twenty minutes for Dawson to receive assistance. Twenty minutes for a woman who collapsed just outside of hospital doors. The officers only took appropriate medical action after her prolonged collapse dispelled the notion that she was just making herself dead weight to resist arrest.

It’s easy to second-guess after the fact. Perhaps Dawson’s delicate health would have failed at any given moment. But there simply has to be a better way to deal with a sick patient who doesn’t want to leave a hospital than by dragging her out and letting her lay motionless on the ground for 20 minutes. Dawson’s death indicates a failure on both the hospital and the officers.