'I won't jump for you': an Arizona police officer let a man drown in a lake and didn't even try to help

Last month, a man drowned in a lake in Arizona. He pleaded for help, floundering in the water, and local police officers standing nearby refused to rescue him, according to officials and body camera transcripts, according to Insider.

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"I'm drowning," Sean Beakings, 34, told Tempe Police Department officials during the May 28 incident at Tempe Town Lake, according to a transcript of the video released by the city.

One officer replied to Beakings, "All right, I won't jump after you."

"Please help me. Please, please, please,” Bikings said, according to the transcript. - I can't swim out. Oh God please help me. Help me".

Beakings, described by city officials as "a defenseless member of the Tempe community," drowned after jumping into a lake but could not swim.

In their statement to Tempe measures, Andrew Ching and Police Chief Jeff Glover called Beakings' death a "tragedy".

Police body camera footage released by city officials shows what happened moments before Beakings jumped into the water.

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Tempe officers were called to the scene just after 5 a.m. May 28 over a reported altercation between Beakings and a woman who identified herself as his wife to police, officials said.

When police officers arrived, they spoke to Beakings and the woman, who officials said had cooperated with police and denied any physical confrontation had taken place.

“He didn't do anything wrong. We have a bad habit of interrupting each other sometimes,” the woman told officers, according to police body camera footage.

Officials said Beekings climbed over a 3-foot metal fence and jumped into the water as police ran the couple's names through a database to check for pending arrest warrants as part of standard procedure.

“Neither of them was detained for any offense,” authorities said about the couple.

Seconds before Beakings jumped into the water, he told the officers, “I'm going to go swimming. I can go, right?"

The officers told Beakings that he was not allowed to swim in the lake.

"How far do you think he can swim?" one of the officers asked, as body camera footage shows.

Shortly thereafter, an officer could be heard radioing that the "subject" had jumped into the lake. The moment of the drowning was not included in the video footage released by the police, and instead a disclaimer was shown on the video before it ended: "Due to the sensitive nature of the remainder of the footage, a transcript of the confidential portion of the event is provided for full transparency."

Moments after Beakings jumped into the water, an officer asked him, "So, what's your plan right now?"

“I’m going to drown,” Bikings began. "I'm going to drown."

During the trial, a footage was released where the police and Beakings' alleged wife were arguing, and at one point she said, "I'm just going crazy because he's drowning right in front of you and you're not helping."

Earlier in the transcript, the officer told the woman, "If you want to help your husband, then talk to your husband, talk to your husband to get him out."

At one point, two officers said another officer was "going to get behind the boat," the transcript says.

Beakings "swam about 30-35 meters before repeatedly pointing out that he was sinking."

“He soon went underwater and never resurfaced,” police said in a statement.

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Three Tempe police officers who did not intervene to save the drowning man were placed on paid leave as the Arizona Department of Public Safety and the Scottsdale Police Department investigated the officers' actions, the city said in a June 3 statement.

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