Fred Kerley, a 29-year-old Olympic sprinter, has been arrested and charged with battery following an altercation with Miami Beach. According to a local news report, Kerley was tased after allegedly approaching the scene of an active investigation on Jan. 2.
Following his arrest, Kerley was charged with battery on a police officer, corrections officer, or firefighter, resisting an officer without violence, and disorderly conduct.
Miami Beach Police reported that Frederick Kerley approached the scene of an active police investigation in Miami near the 100 block of Ninth Street.
The Team USA sprinter told officers that he was concerned about his car, which was parked near the investigation site. Authorities explained that Kerley was interfering with the investigation when he approached the crime scene.
Detectives on the scene described the sprinter as becoming increasingly aggressive and repeatedly refusing orders to get back.
Police used a stun gun on Kerley after he denied officers’ request for him to leave the scene.
As seen in the NBC obtained body camera footage, the officer’s altercation with Kerley ensues after one pushes Kerley in the chest. Several officers on the scene then proceeded to force the sprinter to the ground — while one struck him multiple times.
Kerley’s girlfriend, Cleo Rahman, was reportedly also at the scene when the altercation broke out. She urged officers to stop during the altercation, and she was eventually arrested for resisting arrest as well.
She described, “And they tased him, hit him with the Taser. Look, as soon as he tries to get up. [An officer] pushed my hand out of the way, and when I tried to pull back, they arrested me.”
She continued, “I was literally recording because he’s an athlete, and I didn’t want anything to happen to him, and if something did happen to him, I wanted to make sure that I had the footage.”
After Kerley was tased, officers called for emergency backup.
The Olympic sprinter appeared before Judge Mindy S. Glazer of the Miami-Dade Circuit on Jan. 3.
During the initial hearing, Glazer seemed to express some disappointment at how the Miami Beach Police treated Kerley.
She said, “This could have been handled a different way, and I don’t know if the officers in Miami Beach are busy handling a lot of complicated crime scenes.”
Kerley has won Olympic medals in the men’s 100-meter race for the past two national events. He won a silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and a bronze at last year’s 2024 Paris Games.
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