The Seattle Seahawk’s defensive end, Michael Bennett, claimed that he was the victim of police brutality on a recent trip to Las Vegas – his Tweet on the subject went instantly viral across social media. He is just one of very many NFL players who have followed Colin Kaepernick’s example of sitting, kneeling, or otherwise ignoring the National Anthem before each football game.
According to Bennett, Las Vegas police pulled a gun on him just for “being a black man in the wrong place at the wrong time,” and is considering filing a civil rights case against the police department.
Bennett, a31 year old multimillionaire football player, was in Las Vegas to attend the recent boxing match between Floyd Mayweather and Connor McGregor. And as he was heading to his hotel with his entourage, he heard loud noises resembling gunshots. In response, he fled the scene, but was soon detained by the police in the area.
The American football star recalls that he was ordered to the ground, and was told that if he moved the officer would, “blow my f***ing head off.”
Bennett says that all through the incident he was “terrified and confused,” and adding up to the insult, the other officer “forcefully jammed his knee” in the players back and handcuffed him.
He wrote, “The Officers’ excessive use of force was unbearable … I felt helpless as I lay there on the ground handcuffed facing the real-life threat of being killed.”
Furthermore he added that the officers ignored his continuous pleas and placed him in the back of the cruiser for what seemed like forever until recognizing him for who he was and letting him go.
In his letter he added, “This fact is unequivocally, without question why before every game I sit during the national anthem … because equality doesn’t live in this country and no matter how much money you make, what job title you have, or how much you give, when you are seen as a ‘n*****,’ you will be treated that way … The system failed me. I can only imagine what Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, and Charleena Lyles felt.”
Bennett has appointed Oakland attorney John Burris to pursue the case. The lawyer commented that Bennett was not only “unarmed,” but was “sober, and not involved in any altercations or dispute at the time the police officers arrested and threatened to use deadly force against him.”
Burris continued, “We think there was an unlawful detention and the use of excessive force, with a gun put to his head,” Burris added. “He was just in the crowd. He doesn’t drink or do drugs. He wasn’t in a fight. He wasn’t resisting … He did nothing more or less than anyone in the crowd.”
Burris explained that the only reason Bennett waited so long to go public about this incident was to gather ample time to seek out police records of Bennett’s detainment.
