“I was a one-minute walk away from where it happened. It was way too close to home. You always hear about it. You got pulled over for not having your seatbelt on. You got pulled over for jaywalking. You got pulled over for going two miles over the speed limit. I’ve physically seen profiling. I’ve seen me walking up the street with my friends, and the police officers get out of their car and bust the hell out of my friends. And they can’t do anything about it, and the cop gets back in his car and drives off.

“I’ve had friends who have been beaten up by police officers who put phone books in their T-shirts and then beat them up, then drive off. So these are things that are going on in the community.”

“Why wouldn’t the police officers be on edge? Why wouldn’t they be alert? And why wouldn’t people in the community trust police officers? Because they are consistently harassing them, and they have experience with police officers doing awful things.”

In a recent interview with Bleacher Report’s Jeremy Botter, top UFC welterweight Tyron Woodley discusses the recent fallout in Ferguson and his personal dealings in the area.

The top UFC contender explained in the interview that he hopes for peace and healing in the community he once called home.