New York – The police officer whose verbal tirade on an Uber driver was caught on video last week apologized over the weekend.
In an interview with NBC Today, Patrick Cherry apologized for his actions and said that he was angry in that moment, but not mad at the driver.
Cherry says when he pulled over the driver, he asked him for his license, and the driver looked away, then looked back at Cherry with a smirk.
“I let my emotions get the better of me,” said Cherry.
The officer also says that his question to the driver of, “How long have you been in this country?” wasn’t based on race, but rather asking the driver about his experience driving in New York City.
Commissioner Bill Bratton said that no good cop can watch the video “without a wince.”
TOT News previously reported news of the video, where Cherry was caught on video screaming at the Uber driver as one of the two passengers, Sanjay Seth, recorded it all and uploaded it to YouTube.
Cherry mocked the driver’s accent, slammed his door and threatened to arrest him for allegedly breaking three traffic laws.
Seth tweeted that he questions Cherry’s side of the story and his “interpretation” of the incident. He says the Civilian Complaint Review Board needs to sort out the facts.
Cherry was stripped of his badge and gun, and taken out of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force.
