(Reuters) - New York officials were preparing for likely protests as a grand jury decides whether to charge police in the death of a black man subjected to a banned choke hold, but aimed to avoid the kind of violence that engulfed a St. Louis suburb last month.

Protest groups have planned marches if the grand jury does not charge any of the officers involved in the July 17 incident, which led to the death of Eric Garner, a 43-year-old father of six. It is not clear when the grand jury will rule.

Officials on Staten Island, the city's smallest borough and site of Garner's death, have been told to expect a heightened police presence in the wake of violent protests last week after a grand jury in Missouri did not charge a white police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black teen in August.

Protesters may march to federal prosecutors' offices in Brooklyn, which some hope will take over the Garner case if there is no local indictment,