Milwaukee police have released video of Sterling Brown’s arrest and it’s absolutely horrifying.
Body camera footage of Milwaukee Bucks player Sterling Brown getting assaulted by police offers was released on Wednesday, by the very department in question. Brown was arrested back in January after police began searching his car in the parking lot of a Walgreens.
When Brown objected to the search, that’s when things turned violent. The reason for the altercation stemmed from the fact that Brown’s car was double parked in two handicapped spaces. When he continued to question officers, Brown was thrown to the ground by officers and at one point tased. No charges were ever brought in the arrest and an investigation by the department found that the officers involved acted inappropriately and were subsequently disciplined.
Until today, we had only heard about what happened that night. But Milwaukee Police released body cam footage and it’s truly hard to watch.
Warning: The video contains extreme and graphic imagery:
Milwaukee police released the following statement along with the footage:
"On January 26, 2018 at approximately 2:00 a.m., members of the Milwaukee Police department encountered Sterling Brown near the 2700 block of W. National Ave. regarding a parking violation. During the encounter, Mr. Brown was decentralized, tased and arrested. The Department conducted an investigation into the incident which revealed members acted inappropriately and those members were recently disciplined. Criminal charges against Mr. Brown were not pursued. I am sorry this incident escalated to this level. Today we are releasing body camera video capturing the interaction. The Milwaukee Police Department’s Open Records Division is still working to fulfill all requests for this video. When I took office, I vowed to rebuild the trust between the Milwaukee Police Department and the community. We are doing that. I promised that when the Department is involved in events of this nature, we will be honest about them. We are. I also promised to change the direction of the Department and through meetings with intergovernmental partners, community-based and faith organizations, and system partners we have begun that process. The men and women of the Milwaukee Police Department are dedicated to protecting and serving the citizens of Milwaukee. We have hundreds of interactions with citizens each day, and those contacts end positively. Therefore, we ask residents to work with us in our shared vision of making Milwaukee a safe place to live, work and raise a family."
The release of this footage came on the same day the NFL voted to punish players who protest during the national anthem. The movement was originally started by Colin Kaepernick as a means of speaking out against instances of police brutality in the African American community.