Two Black men recently stared down the barrel of a cop’s gun in Massachusetts. Several people reported that an off-duty police officer, who is white, pointed his personal weapon at the men after a car accident on July 18.
Now, the officer, identified as Stephen Burke, was being investigated by the Brookline Police Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility for over the incident.
Burke, who has been with the Brookline department since 2015, drove his own pick-up truck and got involved in a collision with the man’s BMW. His passenger side door was hit before Burke pulled to the roadside to exchange information with the other car’s driver in Brookline, a Boston suburb. However, he said, the other driver pulled back into traffic. Burke then began to follow the BMW, saying that he thought the driver was attempting to flee the scene before running a red light. Burke later pulled up alongside the vehicle and then pulled out his firearm while identifying himself as a police officer and initiating a public stop.
The scene got the attention of several witnesses who called authorities, a police report said.
Several Brookline officers arrived at the scene in which the two unidentified men were handcuffed and sitting on the curb. Burke handcuffed one man, and an on-duty cop had restrained the other one for “safety purposes,” a report said.
No one was arrested, and the BMW driver was issued a citation and court summons.
Burke has been placed on administrative duty pending the investigation, police Lieutenant Philip Harrington said.