In the trial of Aurora police officer Nathan Woodyard, prosecutors this week called medical experts to testify about Elijah McClain’s cause of death in 2019 after a struggle with Aurora police officers and an injection of ketamine by a paramedic.

A lung doctor reiterated his opinion from the previous trial of two other police officers that health complications from the struggle with police made the ketamine injection more risky for McClain.

Officer Woodyard faces charges of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide in connection with McClain’s death.

David Beuther, a pulmonologist and critical care physician at National Jewish Health, testified Thursday the ketamine McClain received “knocked out his ability to breathe completely” and he believes McClain more likely than not would have survived without the injection. But he said McClain’s vomiting and increasing struggle to breathe while handcuffed on the ground created a cycle of health complications that still put him in grave danger before the ketamine injection.

“The chance that the ketamine caused him to die became much greater,” Beuther said.

The jury is also expected to hear again from Stephen Cina, the forensic pathologist who performed McClain’s autopsy in 2019. Cina previously opined he can’t say for certain whether the struggle with police contributed to McClain’s death. He originally found the cause and manner of death undetermined, but later changed his report to say “complications of ketamine administration following forcible restraint” caused McClain’s death.

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Woodyard was the first of three officers who approached McClain after a 17-year-old 911 caller said McClain, who was wearing earbuds and listening to music, seemed “sketchy” and was waving his arms as he walked home on the night of Aug. 24, 2019. McClain, a 23-year-old massage therapist, was often cold and wore a runner’s mask and jacket that night, prosecutors have said.

Prosecutors say Woodyard put his hands on McClain less than 10 seconds after getting out of his patrol car, without introducing himself or explaining why he wanted to talk to McClain. McClain, seemingly caught off guard, tried to keep walking. 

Woodyard told him he had the right to stop McClain because he was “being suspicious.”

Officer Randy Roedema said several times during the struggle he saw McClain try to grab former officer Jason Rosenblatt’s gun. Woodyard put him in a neck hold that can induce brief unconsciousness, known as a carotid hold because it presses against a person’s carotid artery. Prosecutors have refuted claims that there’s any evidence McClain reached for Rosenblatt’s gun. 

Paramedics later injected McClain with a 500-milligram dose of ketamine, a powerful sedative. A doctor pronounced him brain dead three days later.

Prosecutors accuse Woodyard of breaking from his training by not taking measures required after the use of a carotid hold, such as checking McClain’s vital signs and making sure he was in a good position to breathe.

Woodyard’s defense attorneys argue he had to react quickly during the encounter and did not have the luxury of hindsight in understanding what happened to McClain’s health over the course of the struggle with officers.

As in the cases of two other officers who already faced trial, Woodyard’s defense attorneys seek to lay blame instead on Aurora Fire Rescue paramedics who are scheduled for trial next month, because of the decision to inject McClain with the sedative ketamine after the 18-minute struggle with police. Paramedics Jeremy Cooper and Peter Cichuniec are scheduled to be prosecuted in the final trial in connection with McClain’s death next month.

A jury convicted Roedema on Oct. 12 of criminally negligent homicide and third-degree assault, the least serious charges he faced, but acquitted Rosenblatt on all counts.

Roedema could get anywhere from probation to three years in prison when he’s sentenced Jan. 5.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.