PHOENIX – A former Arizona Cardinals player is considering legal action after he was handcuffed at gunpoint by police while picking his daughter up from the airport earlier this month.
Wesley Leasy, who is Black, suggested that race could have been a factor in his detention. However, the Mesa Police Department said the officer response was based on the make and color of his car.
“I would say that it did have a racial tone to it,” Leasy told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Outspoken with Bruce and Gaydos on Thursday. “Especially when you know that the person that you’re pursuing is a white male.”
Attorney Benjamin Taylor, who joined his client during the interview, said he’s planning to sue Mesa Police over the April 10 incident at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
“What they did to Mr. Leasy and his daughter was unconstitutional. … Pointing guns, searching his vehicle, that’s just totally wrong and, of course, in order to get justice, we have to pursue a lawsuit,” Taylor said.
What led up to incident at Phoenix airport?
Detective Sabrina Amyx, a Mesa Police spokesperson, said officers were tracking a car seen leaving the scene of a shooting at an apartment complex on Country Club Drive south of the Loop 202 Red Mountain Freeway before the airport incident.
A police air unit until followed the suspect vehicle as it headed west on the Loop 202 but had to end its pursuit due to flight restrictions at Rural Road in Tempe, about 5 miles east of the airport.
Officers on the ground then spotted Leasy’s white Mercedes sedan and followed it to the airport because it matched witness descriptions of the suspect’s vehicle.
“We do not believe officers with the vehicle were aware of a suspect description prior to or at the time of the traffic stop,” Amyx said.
Leasy, who lives in Scottsdale, said he noticed a large police presence when he arrived at the airport to pick up his adult daughter. He circled several times because her luggage was delayed. He then stopped to greet her at the terminal and put her bags in his car.
“I go to get in my side and I hear this, ‘Put your hands up. Hold your hands up,’” said Leasy, who played linebacker for the Cardinals for two seasons in the mid-90s.
Ex-Cardinals player describes ordeal
His first thought was that he was a bystander caught up in the middle of something. He soon realized that wasn’t the case.
“I look over my left shoulder and I look back, and I’m like, ‘Oh my god, he’s talking to me,’” Leasy said.
The former NFL player said he saw about 20 officers pointing guns at him and his daughter, who started crying.
“They already saw my daughter standing on the curb with her bags,” Leasy said. “They watched me hug my daughter, kiss her on the cheek, put the bags in the car, and I’m very, very disappointed in that. Even if you suspected me as a criminal, why didn’t you protect the citizen that you knew was not involved.”
In fact, police put both Leasy and his daughter in handcuffs, according to Taylor.
“It doesn’t make any sense why they would point all these rifles at him and put him in handcuffs and throw him on the ground like he’s a criminal and search his vehicle,” the attorney said.
Amyx, the police spokesperson, said officers released Leasy and his daughter as soon as they confirmed he wasn’t the shooting suspect.
“I hope there’s not a color or race undertone to this whole thing,” Leasy said. “I would like to think that this was just poor policing.”
Afterward, a sergeant at the scene explained the situation and apologized to Leasy.
While the tension was lifted at the end of the ordeal, it doesn’t mean Leasy was OK with what transpired.
“When there’s not a gun pointed in your face, yeah, we can be friends now. … That’s quite a different thing when I’m looking down the barrel of a gun from many officers barking out directions that, frankly, … shouldn’t have been done,” Leasy said.
The post Ex-Cardinals player describes being handcuffed at gunpoint by police at Phoenix airport appeared first on KTAR.
