Surveillance video released Friday shows ex-tennis star James Blake being violently taken out by an undercover NYPD cop in a case of mistaken identity outside a Manhattan hotel Wednesday night.
On the video, Blake is seen quietly standing in front of a column outside the Grand Hyatt hotel in Manhattan when a plainclothes officer rushes up and slams the unsuspecting Blake to the sidewalk.
Officer James Frascatore grabs Blake by his left arm, shoves him up against a glass door and throws him onto the ground, where Frascatore then uses his right knee and shin to pin Blake facedown as he handcuffs the one-time No. 4 ranked tennis player behind his back.
Several passers-by gawk at the spectacle, with an older woman in a pink shirt and orange ball cap briefly approaching and pointing at the pair before walking away.
The video ends with Frascatore flipping the handcuffed Blake over, helping him to his feet and escorting him off-camera.
According to the New York Daily News, Blake was mistaken for one of two British men who stole an American Express card and purchased high-end items such as Cristal Champagne, Louis Vuitton bags and high-end shoes from Barneys.
Here is Blake on the left and his lookalike, Jarmaine Grey, who was charged with grand larceny and identity theft Friday morning on the right:
Grey and James Short were arraigned Thursday and given a Tuesday court date. Bail was set at $50,000 apiece and they had to turn over their passports.
Frascatore has been stripped of his badge and gun pending a probe by the NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau, and NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton said he spoke with Blake and “personally apologized” Thursday afternoon.
But in a video posted online by TMZ, Blake told a photographer that he wasn’t satisfied with Bratton’s expression of regret.
“Have you accepted an apology from the commissioner?” the paparazzo asked Blake as he was enjoying a night out in the Meatpacking District with his wife, Emily Snider.
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