Tyreek Hill was taken to the ground while cuffed by Miami-Dade cops for a traffic violation.
Not everyone knows what happened to Tyreek Hill, the star wide receiver for the Miami Dolphins last Sunday, so let me fill you in.
He was on his way to Hard Rock Stadium, the home of the Dolphins when the cops pulled him over.
Now, I want to be honest about why they did that.
It’s not because he was wearing a du-rag, like what happened to me when the police in Valley Brook, Oklahoma stopped me and searched my car during my senior year of high school. Nor was it because he was driving a very nice car while Black, like what happened to a friend of mine in Dallas, Texas in 2019. Yes, Hill was driving a very nice car (a McLaren 720S to be clear). And while wearing a du-rag can get you pulled over (as happened to me) or driving a nice car while Black (as happened to my friend), they had a good reason to pull over Tyreek. (And it is not because he has repeatedly and credibly been accused of serious acts of violence. No, the police don’t care about that.)
He was driving 20 miles over the speed limit. That will certainly get you a ticket. Especially if you do so in game day traffic. So, I don’t fault the police for pulling him over. They should have given him a ticket and let him go on his merry way.
They did not do that.
“This morning…Tyreek Hill was pulled over for a traffic incident about one block from the stadium and briefly detained by police,” the Dolphins said on X. “He has since been released. Several teammates saw the incident and stopped to offer support. Tyreek and all other players involved have safely arrived to the stadium and will be available for today’s game.”
But that Tweet does not tell the whole story.
Things escalated in the traffic stop when Tyreek rolled up his window to the police officer who pulled him over. Hill said he did so because there were fans walking to the stadium and he dd not want to cause a scene. This perceived sign of disrespect so enraged the police officer that he forced Hill out the car, pushed him to the ground, appeared to handcuff him, and put a knee in his back.
When defensive end Calais Campbell, Hill’s teammate and the 2019 Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year, and Jonnu Smith, a tight end for the team, stopped and tried to intervene, the police told them back up. When Campbell refused, they detained him, putting him in handcuffs.
“I don’t want to bring race into it, but sometimes it gets kind of iffy when you do,” the star wide receiver said. “What if I wasn’t Tyreek Hill? Lord knows what that guy or guys would have done”
You could have ended up dead, Tyreek. That’s what could have happened. Just ask Philando Castile, Mike Brown, Sandra Bland, or Sonya Massey.
Since George Floyd, the white folks who went on Instagram and posted black squares in solidarity with the Movement for Black Lives have forgotten about the way police victimize Black folks. Maybe they’ve moved on to the war in Gaza, another trendy atrocity for white activists to protest who will likely forget about it in a year. Since the outcry over George Floyd in 2020, fatal police shootings took a slight dip, but they are back on the rise.
Colin Kaepernick kneeled to raise awareness about what was happening to Black folks in America, but the conversation has since changed. It is not about police brutality anymore, it is now about if he will ever work for the NFL again.
And the boys in blue keep victimizing us.
What happened to Tyreek Hill, a beloved figure in Miami should teach us a lesson.
No matter how much money you make; no matter what team you play for; no matter how famous you are—if you are Black, you can be victimized at the hands of the police. That fact will not change no matter who we put in the White House.
The post The Victimization of Tyreek Hill appeared first on CounterPunch.org.
This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Lawrence Ware.
Lawrence Ware | Radio Free (2024-09-12T05:55:29+00:00) The Victimization of Tyreek Hill. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2024/09/12/the-victimization-of-tyreek-hill/
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