Tennis star James Blake was illegally detained by the NYPD after he was tackled and handcuffed by a white police officer dressed in plain clothes.
Blake was once ranked No. 4 in the world for tennis, is famous and, well, biracial.
The officers present, who Blake claims never displayed badges or announced they were law enforcement, attempted to arrest him and said he looked just like the criminal they were actually hunting, another black man involved in credit card fraud to the tune of an alleged $18,000.
None of which had anything to do with Blake.
The Editorial Board can’t help but feel that this is yet another example of, if not brutality, then an overreaction and aggression by police forces toward persons of color.
But we took a little step back.
In an investigation as high-stakes and confusing as thousands of dollars in credit card fraud with the potential for the perpetrator to run, police need to act quickly.
In fact, we want them to, in order to feel safe on the streets.
However, the use of excessive violence and force needs to be heavily criticized.
If officers are unsure if they’ve got the right guy, then the mentality “shoot first ask questions later,” or in this case “tackle first ask questions later” cannot apply.
It places innocent people in danger, not from criminals but from police officers.
It wastes time — while these officers detained Blake, the fraud case was stalled unnecessarily.
Of course we recognize that race played a big part in this.
Police officers clearly tackled the first black guy they saw, disregarded his explanations and did not listen to him when he tried to provide identification.
And we question whether or not a less famous black person who is unaffiliated with an association like the U.S. Tennis Association, would have received an apology from the NYPD.
It seems like not even persons of color who are well-known and well-liked can escape police brutality, but they are the only ones that walk away with an apology.
If we cannot trust police forces to respect the innocent people they detain, then we don’t trust that they respect actual criminals and do their best to keep them out of danger.
These aggressions demonstrate that police officers need to be better trained and prepared to deal with innocent people who they rough-up and detain.
And there needs to be further review of how much force an officer is allowed to use, and when and how to control their emotions.
If this had played out without force or violence, Blake would have been able to walk away from the incident unscathed, and the NYPD wouldn’t have brought a huge scandal down on their heads.
Moreover, a restraint of violence means a lessening of brutality and, hopefully, a significant decline in the unfair deaths of persons of color.
