Source: Lawrence Lucier / Getty
Just because someone is a celebrity doesn’t mean they are exempt from racial profiling. Just ask Golden Globe winner Ving Rhames.
During a recent conversation about racism on SiriusXM’s The Clay Cane Show, the Mission: Impossible — Fallout star said that earlier this year he was held at gunpoint after a neighbor called the police because they believed a “large Black man” had broken into his Santa Monica, California home.
The ordeal went down while he was watching ESPN in the early afternoon.
“I get up, I open the door and there’s a red dot pointed at my face from a 9-millimeter [gun], and they say, ‘Put up your hands.’ Literally,” he claimed.
Thankfully, because the officer recognized him, the actor quickly diffused the potentially violent situation.
“He said it was a mistake and apologized,” the actor said, adding that he was still shaken. “My problem is, and I said this to them, what if it was my son and he had a video game remote or something and you thought it was a gun?”
Rhames claims the cop later admitted that a neighbor called 911 on him.
“Myself, the sergeant and one other officer, we went over to that house, which was across the street from my place, and the person denied it,” Rhames said.
He continued: “Here I am in my own home, alone in some basketball shorts. Just because someone called and said a large black man is breaking in, when I opened up the wooden door a 9mm is pointed at me.”
Of course, folks took to Twitter to sound off about what happened to Rhames:
https://twitter.com/danibostick/status/1023067122015055872
https://twitter.com/nkjemisin/status/1022967038468411393
Listen to his entire interview with Clay Cane below:
Ving Rhames Held At Gunpoint In His Own Home Because Neighbor Believed A ‘Large Black Man’ Broke In was originally published on hellobeautiful.com
