NEW YORK CITY — Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton said they informed James Blake about the efforts the city is making to improve the relationship between police and the community after meeting with the retired tennis star Monday to discuss his mistaken arrest and rough handling by police last week.
After the City Hall meeting, Blake said he had a "very productive" conversation with de Blasio and Bratton.
"A bit of the general theme was accountability and making sure we focused on that with the police officers in general. I feel like we made a lot of progress and we are all pleasantly surprised," Blake said.
In a joint statement, de Blasio and Bratton agreed with Blake.
“This afternoon, we had a productive conversation with Mr. Blake about strengthening the relationship between police and communities across our city," the statement read.
"It was based on a shared commitment to accountability and a desire to build trust. We pledged a fair and expeditious investigation into his case, and to find further common ground as we continue the work of reform.”
De Blasio at an earlier press conference had said he was also going to talk about the effort to retrain all officers on patrol to reduce "any unnecessary use of force."
Efforts to retrain police were launched after the chokehold death of Staten Island man Eric Garner who police accused of selling loose cigarettes.
The city settled a wrongful death suit with Garner's family in July for $5.9 million.
Blake, who was once the fourth-ranked tennis player in the world, was tackled outside of the Grand Hyatt Hotel on E. 42nd Street on Sept. 9 after being mistaken for an identity theft suspect.
A video released by police shows James Frascatore, a 38-year-old police officer, tackling Blake outside the hotel before flipping him over on his stomach, handcuffing him and leading him away from the scene.
Blake said the officer did not identify himself and that he was held for 15 minutes until police realized he was not involved in the scheme.
Both de Blasio and Bratton apologized to Blake and the officer had his badge and gun taken away and was placed on administrative duty.
Blake has called for the officer to be fired and has said he hopes to use the incident to bring attention to the regular citizens that have unjust and rough encounters with police, but who don't get the same level of media attention or apologies from city leaders afterward.
"We're talking about lasting impact," said Blake.
"We're not looking for a quick lawsuit, we're not looking for anything that's going to be a quick and easy solution. We're looking for a lasting, positive impact on the city and on the police force.'
Police union president Patrick Lynch criticized those calling for Frascatore's dismissal and said there may have been "mitigating circumstances" that caused the officer to behave the way he did that won't be revealed until after an investigation.
Blake said he understood that Frascatore has the right to due process before a decision is made about his continued employment with the police department.
Asked if Blake was getting special treatment because of his celebrity, de Blasio said, "I talk to a lot of regular citizens" and that his goal was to explain the city's efforts at police reform to Blake.
"We don't want to see this kind of thing happen. We want to see a better relationship between police and community, we want to see force used only in the degree necessary, and that effort has been underway for the last year."
