By Police1 Staff
HILLCREST HEIGHTS, Md. — An officer was off duty in plain clothes when he says a Prince George’s County police sergeant inappropriately searched, tackled and hit him in the face.
According to the Washington Post, the officers were looking for a gunman near a Maryland mall Tuesday afternoon.
Officer Robert Parker Jr. told the publication that the sergeant who initially detained him gave him no warning or identified why he was being searched. Parker said he didn’t have a chance to identify that he was an officer or had a weapon.
Parker said as he was being searched, and identified himself as an officer, the sergeant felt the gun and two backup officers rushed up and punched him in the face.
The department told the Post that Parker fit the description of an armed shooter who wounded someone in the parking lot.
“We believe our officer acted professionally and with restraint,” Lt. Dave Coleman said . “This encounter took place within several minutes of the shooting being reported at Iverson Mall and occurred three blocks from the shooting scene.”
After a preliminary review, Coleman said he didn’t know how much time elapsed before Parker was tackled, but said “he had plenty of time to identify himself as a police officer.”
“I thought, if I were in another neighborhood, if I were someone else, if the lookout was for a white guy in a hoodie and I was white, I don’t think I would have been approached like that,” Parker said. “I think I would have been given a lot more courtesy.”