Yves Sakila, a 35-year-old Congolese man, died after being restrained by security personnel and later handcuffed by gardaí on Henry Street in Dublin city centre last Friday shortly after 5pm. A video circulating on messaging apps shows a group of men holding him face down on the pedestrianised street as the incident unfolded.

The footage lasts almost five minutes and shows five people keeping Sakila on the ground until gardaí arrived. At least some of the men appear to be security personnel, and one man is seen briefly trying to place a knee on Sakila’s head or neck to restrain him. No members of the Garda appeared to be at the scene when the recording was made.

Gardaí said Sakila had been pursued after he was suspected of shoplifting from a retailer, and that he knocked an elderly man in his 80s to the ground as he fled. The pensioner was seriously injured and remained hospitalised. When officers reached the scene, they found Sakila had already been held down for a period by security guards. They handcuffed him to get control of the situation and to attend to the injured man.

What happened next turned the scene from a chase into a death investigation. Gardaí removed Sakila’s handcuffs and began CPR almost immediately after realising he was unwell. He was taken to the Mater hospital and later pronounced dead.

The sequence now under scrutiny is not the shoplifting allegation itself but the force used in the seconds and minutes that followed. Investigators are focusing on whether the manner of restraint and the force used at the scene were factors in Sakila’s death, while further analysis of the postmortem remains required before the reasons for his death can be conclusively determined.

The Irish Network Against Racism said the death of a black man in such circumstances was extremely worrying. Shane O’Curry said the group urged authorities to thoroughly investigate all of the circumstances leading to Sakila’s death so minority ethnic communities could retain confidence in the criminal justice system. The Congolese community in Dublin plans a vigil for Sakila on Tuesday.

Garda Headquarters has referred the death to Fiosrú, the Office of the Police Ombudsman, which investigates incidents where a person is seriously injured or dies at or around the time of contact with members of the Garda. That referral ensures an outside inquiry will now sit alongside the criminal and medical questions already surrounding the case.