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Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill says he is looking for “accountability on both sides” after he was briefly detained by the Miami-Dade police as part of a traffic stop before Sunday’s game against the Jacksonville Jaguars.
“Let’s not get mad, let’s learn,” Hill told Taylor Rooks in an interview aired on Thursday Night Football (3:00 mark of the video below.) “Because the more we get mad, I feel like that’s moving us backwards. It’s all about accountability, on both sides.
“Like okay, I’m going to take accountability for my wrongs. I want to know where I went wrong, how can I get better. And I want to hear that side of the accountability on that side, too.”
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The Miami-Dade Police Department on Monday released body camera footage of the traffic stop, during which police officers forcibly pulled Hill out of his car shortly after pulling him over.
Hill spent 20 minutes in handcuffs before he was released. He was then reportedly cited for careless driving and a seatbelt violation.
“It’s tough, it’s hard. Going through something like that, it’s traumatic, it’s embarrassing,” Hill told Rooks.
Hill continued: “I just feel like I’m not representing the name on the back of my jersey the right way. The flip side of it is, it’s great, ’cause I can at least try to bring awareness to what this whole entire country’s been trying to fix for the past decade.
“You got pros, and then you got cons, in every situation. It’s all about what you do with it. You learn from your situation, you hold yourself accountable.”
Body camera footage shows the traffic stop escalated after Hill, upon being told to roll his window down, rolled it down slightly and said “Don’t tell me what to do.”
“In the heat of the moment, the officer’s thinking about his safety, I’m thinking about, I don’t want pictures taken of me, and people saying, ‘Hey, is that ‘Reek before a game, getting pulled over?'” Hill said. “So I tried to meet in the middle, and say, here’s my ID, and I’m going to leave my window barely [down.]
“But does that give them the right to pull me out of my car? No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t give them the right to put their hands on me, antagonize me, because there was a lot of that going on.”
Hill told Rooks that while he was handcuffed, an officer “was pinching me on my neck, trying to get me to do something to him.”
He concluded that he hoped his experience, which was recorded both by bystanders and the police, would ultimately have a positive impact.
“We’re going to have some very uncomfortable conversations, and hopefully we’re able to move the needle,” Hill said. “Because as athletes, we want to be able to help the police. We want to be their voice, because we all want a safe community.”
Hill on Wednesday called for one of the police officers involved in the incident, who his attorney identified as the “escalating officer,” to be fired. The officer, identified as Danny Torres, has been placed on administrative duties during the department’s ongoing investigation into the incident.
