Body-cam footage of Tyreek Hill incident shows rapid escalation

In a portion of the footage, an officer is shown pulling a car over and telling Hill, the driver, to roll his window back down. After the officer repeats the request, the situation gets more tense as Hill is pulled from his car and placed in handcuffs, face down on the street.

Earlier Monday, an attorney for Hill and the South Florida Police Benevolent Association released statements offering differing versions of the encounter. Hill’s legal team said it believed “this matter was escalated due to overzealous officers attempting to impose their authority,” while the head of the police union described Hill as “uncooperative.”

Hill was released from police custody after about 30 minutes Sunday morning and was able to help the Dolphins beat the Jacksonville Jaguars. By the time the game ended, his confrontation with the police had made national headlines, with parts of the episode filmed and shared online by passing motorists.

Noting that protocol normally calls for body-cam footage to be released after any internal reviews have concluded, Miami-Dade Police Director Stephanie V. Daniels said Monday that the available footage of the incident with Hill was being shared sooner than that to “reinforce the Department’s commitment to keeping the public informed.”

Daniels said Sunday that one of the officers involved in the incident was “placed on administrative duties” as her department conducted an investigation.

The portion of the footage showing Hill getting pulled over begins just before 10:20 a.m., with the 30-year-old driving a black sports car down a street leading to the Dolphins’ stadium in Miami Gardens, Fla. An officer on a motorcycle is seen approaching Hill’s car and, after he disembarks, the driver’s-side window can be seen being rolled up.

After the officer knocks on Hill’s window, he rolls it down and tells the officer not to do that. As Hill is asked why he is not wearing a seat belt, he repeatedly tells the officer, “Don’t knock on my window like that.”

After Hill hands his license to the officer, he says: “Just give me my ticket, bro, so I can go. I’m going to be late. Do what you’ve got to do.”

After that comment, Hill rolls his window back up, causing the officer to ask him to keep it down. Soon, the officer raises his voice as he repeats the command, and he tells Hill: “As a matter of fact, get out of the car. Get out of the car right now. We’re not playing this game.”

At that point, another officer can be seen opening Hill’s car door and pulling the player out of the vehicle. Three officers join in pushing Hill to the ground, with one of them telling him, “What part of that don’t you understand?”

Having taken his phone out of the car with him, Hill can be heard telling his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, that he is “getting arrested.”

“When we tell you to do something, you do it, you understand?” an officer tells Hill. “Not when you want, but when we tell you. You’re a little f---ing confused.”

As Hill tells them he was “getting out” of his car, he is told, “Too late.”

The officers then move Hill to the sidewalk and attempt to sit him down as the wide receiver protests that he just had surgery on his knee.

At that point, some of Hill’s teammates, two of whom were identified later by the Dolphins as defensive lineman Calais Campbell and tight end Jonnu Smith, begin to appear at the scene. Campbell also was briefly placed in handcuffs and Smith was given a citation after they did not immediately comply with requests to leave the scene.

“I just want to know what happened,” Campbell is heard telling officers, one of whom replies that it is not his “business.”

A few moments later, an officer is heard saying to another of Hill: “Why is he acting up like that? You know who that is, right? He’s one of the Dolphins’ star players.”

In an appearance Monday night on CNN, Hill said his celebrity might have saved him from even worse treatment. Noting the Colin Kaepernick-led protests in the NFL against police racism and brutality, Hill called on officers and other members of society to come together and “make a change.”

An attorney for Hill, Julius B. Collins, said on CNN that while the officer who initially approached his client was not aggressive, a colleague who quickly joined the scene and “snatched” Hill from the car was “super aggressive.” Collins accused the second officer of putting a knee into Hill’s back, putting his hand on the player’s throat and putting him in “some kind of choke hold.”

“One officer doesn’t make the whole group look bad,” Hill told the network. “Everybody has bad apples. Every team has bad apples.”

Toward the end of the sequence shown in the body-cam footage, approximately 24 minutes after Hill is pulled over, he is released from his handcuffs. An officer can be heard confirming to a colleague that Hill was pulled over for speeding, specified as “careless driving,” and then was seen without a seat belt on and that he was traveling at 60 mph.

Hill, who was heard jawing with police during different parts of the footage, shakes the hands of several officers before he is given his citation and allowed to leave.

In its statement following the release of the body-cam footage, the Dolphins said they were “saddened by the overly aggressive and violent conduct” directed toward Hill, Campbell and Smith by Miami-Dade police.

“It is both maddening and heartbreaking,” the team said, “to watch the very people we trust to protect our community use unnecessary force and hostility towards these players, yet it is also a reminder that not every situation like this ends in peace, as we are grateful this one did.”

Noting their “strong and positive relationship” with Miami-Dade police and an understanding that “the vast majority of officers do serve the community with the utmost character,” the Dolphins urged the department to take “swift and strong action against the officers who engaged in such despicable behavior.”