Comedian Jay Pharoah has released a months-old video that shows him being the victim of the type of police tactic that has been universally condemned since the death of George Floyd.
Pharoah, 32, a popular former cast member on “Saturday Night Live,” finally showed his 550,000 Instagram fans the surveillance footage from February that captures the funnyman in a terrifying predicament as a result of the often-used police phrase “mistaken identity.” The brutal takedown of Pharoah was captured by video from a nearby business.
Without providing a specific date, Pharoah said he was out jogging one day when he was surrounded by a number of cops from the Los Angeles Police Department, once the world’s most notorious law enforcement organization.
“I see an officer to the left of me. I’m not thinking anything of it, because I’m a law-abiding citizen,” Pharoah said. “The officer, I see him coming with guns blazing. I see him say, ‘get on the ground. Put your hands up like you’re an airplane.'”
The seemingly benign LAPD presence quickly turned horrifying once they surrounded him.
“Four officers got their guns blazing,” Pharoah said. “They tell me to get on the ground, spread my arms out, they put me in cuffs, the officer took his knee, put it on my neck.”
Despite the fact that the Pharoah did what the officers commanded, he did ask why they were arresting him.
“They said, ‘You fit the description of a black man in this area with grey sweatpants on and a grey shirt,'” he said.
Once Pharoah asked them to google him to confirm they had the wrong person, the cops released him and apologized.
Despite their concession that they were wrong, Pharoah is scarred for life. The comedian admits he had an upbringing that was different from the average black child in America and was not used to being treated this way.
The suburban-raised Pharoah concedes that “I didn’t experience firsthand racism in America until this year,” he said. Now, Pharoah said he “easily [could have] been an Ahmaud Arbery or a George Floyd.”
Because of that jolting experience, combined with the revolt undergoing in America, Pharoah has a message for his fans:
“I’m Jay Pharoah and I’m a black man in America,” he said. “And my life matters. Black lives always matter. They always matter.”
Please flip the page to observe the surveillance footage of the LAPD’s actions in a case of mistaken identity.
