Written by John Breech at CBS Sports.com
Just hours after Michael Bennett made several startling claims against Las Vegas police, the department strongly defended itself by describing their version of events during a press conference on Wednesday.
According to Bennett, he was assaulted by police after attending the Mayweather-McGregor fight on August 26. At some point after the fight, Bennett was walking back to his hotel when he heard gunshots. The shots were heard by hundreds of people, who all began to flee the area.
Once police were on the scene, Bennett says that they “singled” him out and pointed their guns at him for “nothing more than being a black man in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Bennett also added that the officers used excessive force while he was in custody, and that one cop even threatened to “blow his head off.”
“I can tell you as I stand here today, I see no evidence of that,” McMahill said. “I see no evidence that race played any role in this incident.”
According to McMahill, police received a call around 1:30 a.m. on Sunday about a possible active shooter who was believed to be somewhere around Drai’s nightclub at the Cromwell casino.
When officers arrived at the hotel, it was total chaos as hundreds of people were attempting to flee the supposed shooter (the Daily Mail has a picture that was taken as people were fleeing and you can see that by clicking here).
After clearing the casino, a team of officer’s started heading toward Drai’s nightclub, and while they were on the way there, they located Bennett.
“As they moved toward the nightclub, an individual later identified as Bennett was seen crouched down behind a gaming machine as the officers approached,” McMahill sald. “Once Bennett was in the officer’s view, he quickly ran out the south doors, jumped over a wall onto Flamingo Road East of Las Vegas Boulevard into traffic.”
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