NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — A Brooklyn man who died Thursday may have literally been scared to death by police investigating the theft of a cellphone, the man’s family said Friday.

Carlos Alcis, 43, died of an apparent heart attack early Thursday morning after police entered his Brownsville home. Police said they knocked and that Alcis let them in; his family said officers barged in around 5 a.m. and the father of nine and others in the basement apartment were awakened during the commotion, WCBS 880’s Ginny Kosola reported.

“The police put the flashlight on my face,” said Emmanuel Alcis, Carlos Alcis’ 15-year-old son whom police initially believed was a suspect in the cellphone theft. “I look up, and I couldn’t see who was it.”