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CCTV footage shows police pulling Tyreek Hill from the car
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CCTV footage shows police pulling Tyreek Hill from the car

MIAMI — Newly released bodycam footage from the arrest of Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill shows Miami-Dade police officers pulling the star player from his car and placing him on the sidewalk before placing him in handcuffs.

The footage originally shows Hill being pulled over for speeding as he approaches Hard Rock Stadium on Sunday. It takes about a minute from the time the officer gets off his motorcycle and starts walking toward Hill’s car to the time Hill is forcibly pulled away.

Upon arrival, the officer knocks on Hill’s car window, prompting Hill to roll down the window, hand the officer his driver’s license, and repeatedly tell him not to knock on his window. The footage also shows the officer asking Hill to keep his window down. The incident escalates when Hill fails to cooperate.

Hill tells the officer, “Give me my ticket, bro, so I can go, I’m gonna be late. Do what you gotta do,” and rolls back up his dark tinted window.

“Keep your window open,” the officer told him, tapping on the glass again. Hill can still be seen inside.

Hill rolled down the window a little and said, “Don’t tell me what to do.” He rolled the window back up.

Hill told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Monday night that he rolled his window back up because he was afraid it would attract unwanted attention.

“If I leave my window down, people walking by, driving by, they’re going to notice it’s me,” Hill said. “And they’re going to start taking pictures, and I didn’t want to create a scene. I just really wanted to get a ticket and then go on my way.”

The officer again told Hill to roll his window back down or, “I’m going to get you out of the car. In fact, get out of the car.”

After the officer finally asks Hill to step out of his vehicle, Hill says, “I’m getting out, I’m getting out.” As the officer opens the door and pulls Hill out, the receiver says, “I’m getting out!” At that point, another officer grabs Hill by the back of his head and neck, forces him to lie down on the sidewalk, and places him in handcuffs.

“It went from 0 to 60, man. From the minute those guys pulled up behind me and knocked on my window, it went from 0 to 60,” Hill said Monday in an interview with “NBC Nightly News.”

“I opened my door and wanted to get out, you know what I mean, but it felt like they wanted me to act quickly.”

Hill was able to call Dolphins security director Drew Brooks before he was pulled from his car. The officer who forced Hill to the ground held him in place with a knee on Hill’s back and told Hill to “stop crying.”

“If we tell you to do something, you do it, you understand?” the officer tells Hill. “Not if you want to, but if we tell you to. You’re a little f—ing confused.”

Hill is escorted to the sidewalk and told to sit down. Hill responds that he recently had knee surgery and asks the officers to “hold on.” The same officer who pulled Hill from his vehicle, who was not the closest officer to Hill, then runs up to Hill, throws his arms around his shoulders, and forces him back to the ground. At one point, he puts his hands around Hill’s neck.

The agent is skeptical about Hill’s operation.

“Oh really? What a coincidence,” he said to Hill. “Were you having surgery on your ears when we told you to roll down the window?”

There are no reports of any recent surgeries Hill has undergone. But it is not uncommon for players to undergo unannounced surgeries if they are not of a type that will affect their status for the season.

Dolphins tight end Jonnu Smith witnessed the scene. The footage shows him parking his vehicle a few feet away from Hill and running from his car as Hill is forced to the ground. Officers immediately ask Smith to back up and show identification, which he does.

Smith remains approximately 25 feet away from Hill throughout the recording and is ultimately given a ticket.

Dolphins defensive lineman Calais Campbell arrives on the scene shortly after and is also told to leave. Campbell walks toward the officers with his arms raised.

At one point, one of the responding officers appears to acknowledge that Hill is a professional athlete, though neither Hill nor Campbell admit to being Dolphins players.

“You know who that is, right?” the officer asks. “One of the Dolphins’ star players.”

Campbell is eventually apprehended, while an officer holds the seated Hill in place with a hand on his shoulder.

When Hill complains about being restrained, the officer forces him to the ground before allowing him to sit back down.

“I’ll tell you this — your job is to serve and protect, right?” Hill says. “You’re doing a terrible job protecting right now. I told you I’m not running. … That just makes things worse.”

Hill verbally complies with the officers in the footage. At least one officer attempts to reason with Hill and de-escalate the situation as bystanders film the incident from both the sidewalk and their vehicles.

“I’m just a black man, that’s it,” Hill yells. “I’m just black in America.”

“We’re black too, bro,” an officer replies. “We’re people of color too. Don’t act like that’s special.”

Hill is released after about 25 minutes, when Brooks and Hill’s agent, Drew Rosenhaus, arrive. The audio cuts out several times, but in one corner Hill can be heard telling the officers he would “see you in court” before getting back into his vehicle.

“If I wasn’t Tyreek Hill, at the very least I would probably have been shot or locked up” and “put behind bars, you know, for a simple speeding ticket,” Hill told NBC News.

Hill caught seven passes for 130 yards and an 80-yard touchdown in the Dolphins’ win over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday.

After scoring, he referenced the morning’s incident by putting his hands behind his back and having teammate Jaylen Waddle hold him down as they walked back to the sideline.

Hill told NBC News, “You learn to laugh and have fun” during the celebration.

On Monday night, the Dolphins released a statement saying the team was “saddened by the excessively aggressive and violent behavior toward Tyreek Hill, Calais Campbell and Jonnu Smith,” and that “it is both maddening and heartbreaking to see the people we trust to protect our community use such unnecessary force and hostility toward these players, but it is also a reminder that not every situation like this ends in peace, as we are thankful this one did. ‘What if I wasn’t Tyreek Hill?’ is a question that will have an enormous impact.”

The statement went on to say that the franchise “is proud of its strong and positive relationship with the Miami-Dade Police Department and other law enforcement agencies and recognizes that the vast majority of officers serve the community with the utmost character and desire to protect all citizens. However, as is fully evident in the videos released tonight, there are some officers who confuse their responsibility and dedication to serve with misplaced power. While we commend MDPD for taking the appropriate and necessary action to quickly release this footage, we also urge them to take equally swift and forceful action against the officers who engaged in such despicable behavior.”

“We will stand with Tyreek and our players as they work to use their platform and this situation to make a positive impact in our community. We have always believed that the game of soccer has a unique power to bring people together, and we remain hopeful that through the collective work of the players, the organization and our community partners, we can create lasting change.”

Earlier in the day, the South Florida Police Benevolent Association also released a statement, before the bodycam footage was released, saying Hill was “uncooperative” with officers.

“Prior to yesterday’s Dolphins game, there was an incident where Tyreek Hill was placed in handcuffs prior to being released. First, to be clear, he was never arrested. He was briefly detained for the officers’ safety after driving in a manner that placed himself and others in grave danger,” Steadman Stahl, the association’s president, said in a statement.

“Upon being apprehended, Mr. Hill did not immediately cooperate with officers on scene who, in accordance with policy and for their immediate safety, placed Mr. Hill in handcuffs. Mr. Hill, still uncooperative, refused to sit on the ground and was therefore led to the ground,” Stahl’s statement said.

Stahl told “The Andy Slater Show” that Hill “escalated” the situation and that it would have been handled quicker if Hill had stuck to that.

This report used information from The Associated Press.