Sept. 10--Retired tennis player James Blake wants an apology after New York City police used what he describes as excessive force on him in a case of mistaken identity on Wednesday.
The former fourth-ranked player in the world said he was glancing at his cellphone while waiting outside Manhattan's Grand Hyatt New York hotel on his way to the U.S. Open. According to Blake, he looked up to find five plainclothes police officers rushing him.
One of the officers threw him to the ground and handcuffed him, Blake said.
Turns out Blake was misidentified by a witness as someone who fraudulently purchased a cellphone. He said he was detained for about 15 minutes before being recognized and let go.
"You'd think they could say, 'Hey, we want to talk to you. We are looking into something.' I was just standing there. I wasn't running," Blake told the New York Daily News. "It's not even close [to being OK]. It's blatantly unnecessary. You would think at some point they would get the memo that this isn't OK, but it seems that there's no stopping it."
Blake said one of the officers apologized, but not the one who tackled him.
"I'd like an apology," Blake said Thursday on "Good Morning America." "I'd like an explanation for how they conducted themselves because I think we all need to be held accountable for our actions, and police as well."
Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said on the NY1 cable TV news station said that Blake "has a right to be upset."
Bratton has ordered an internal affairs probe into the incident. Surveillance video is being reviewed and one officer involved has been moved to desk duty.
"It's very disturbing," Bratton said. "The nature of what he described is not what we do. It's not what we're supposed to do."
The 35-year-old Blake is biracial and the officers involved are white, but Bratton told CNN on Thursday "race has nothing at all to do with this.
"If you look at the photograph of the suspect, it looks like the twin brother of Mr. Blake," Bratton said. "So let's put that nonsense to rest right now."
Blake told the Daily News: "To me it's as simple as unnecessary police force, no matter what my race is. In my mind there's probably a race factor involved, but no matter what, there's no reason for anybody to do that to anybody."
