Seattle Seahawks’ Michael Bennett Should Apologize For Racism Charge Against Las Vegas PD, Clay Travis Claims

Seattle Seahawks defensive end Michael Bennett should apologize for falsely accusing Las Vegas police officers of racial profiling. And Bennett actually benefited from “NFL athlete privilege” during the encounter. Those are the contentions of Fox Sports Radio host Clay Travis after cops released more footage of the incident. Travis has also described the National Football League star as a “race-baiting fraud.”

Michael Bennett was in Vegas on August 26 for the Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor boxing match when he was detained for about 10 minutes by cops who were responding to an active shooter call at the Cromwell Las Vegas Hotel & Casino in the early hours of the next morning.

Cops allege that Bennett was hiding near a slot machine when they entered the casino, started running from them, and jumped over a wall in an attempt to evade them.

On September 6, Bennett tweeted out a long, headline-making message claiming that he was racially profiled and subjected to excessive force for “simply being a black man in the wrong place at the wrong time” in the Las Vegas incident.

For some reason, Michael Bennett had no ID in his possession at the time. Cops agreed to Google him, however, after he told them he played for the Seattle Seahawks, and they could check that online, and then let him go after explaining to him that he was stopped because he was spotted running from the scene. (The shots fired call turned out to be false alarm.) Police ordinarily hold someone without an ID until they can verify his or her identity through a law enforcement computer network or other means.

According to TMZ, of the three officers involved in the brief Michael Bennett detention outside the casino, two are Hispanic and one is black.

Clay Travis, who has been covering the story on his radio show and his Outkick the Show Periscope broadcast long after the sports media moved on to other things, penned a lengthy essay on the Outkick the Coverage blog about the Michael Bennett scenario.

“Michael Bennett is a huge beneficiary of NFL athlete privilege. How many people do you think get let go by police when they don’t have ID and have been stopped for suspicious behavior after having them look him up on Google?… It is laughably absurd to suggest that the police picked Bennett out because of racism. If so, why didn’t they also detain the hundreds of black people in the exact same casino at that exact same time? Bennett was detained for a simple reason, because he behaved suspiciously and police believed he might be involved in an alleged shooting.”

In his article, Travis also argued that Bennett — along with the Seahawks and the NFL, which unquestioningly backed him — should apologize, as should the generally liberal sports media that accepted the Seahawks player’s allegations at face value but essentially dropped the story when the footage began emerging that didn’t necessarily fit into the accepted narrative. Law enforcement authorities have offered to let Bennett and his representatives review all the available videos, but they apparently have not taken the authorities up on the offer.

Hey, Pete, you going to apologize to Las Vegas police for this since Michael Bennett is a lying, racebaiting fraud? https://t.co/kDa0mXuLYF

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) October 4, 2017

Clay Travis also insisted that the NFL should suspend Michael Bennett for putting forth false claims that could result in a worsening relationship between minorities and police agencies. “At an absolute minimum Bennett, the Seahawks and the NFL should all apologize to the Las Vegas police for the false accusations they made and endorsed,” he added.

The Las Vegas PD is separately receiving high marks for the way officers responded to the horrific mass shooting incident at the country & western music festival on October 1.

As the Inquisitr previously reported, Metropolitan Police Department Sheriff Joe Lombardo maintains that the cops in the Michael Bennett incident acted appropriately and professionally on the night in question.

The 2-2 Seattle Seahawks with Michael Bennett visit the 3-1 Los Angeles Rams today with a 4:05 p.m. Eastern time kickoff at the LA Memorial Coliseum.

[Featured Image by Ted S. Warren/AP Images]