BOSTON — An off-duty officer involved in a confrontation with a pedestrian did not use excessive force, police say.
The details of an investigation into a Boston police officer who apparently roughed up a pedestrian during an arrest in Back Bay were released in a news conference Tuesday afternoon.
BPD launched an investigation into the officer, now identified as Edward Barrett, who was caught on camera forcefully detaining a man, now identified as Milton Gurin, after some sort of confrontation in a crosswalk.
Gurin said he was walking through the crosswalk and the officer cut him off, to which he responded by rapping on the car's window with his umbrella. That sparked the confrontation in which Barrett allegedly chased the man down and was recorded on cell phone video with his knee in the man's back.
Police say Barrett's actions were justified because he believed Gurin had broken a window on his car, a felony offense, and he did not know what Gurin had used to hit the window.
“Officer Barrett does not know what Mr. Gurin is holding, so he’s trying to maintain control of him until he can ascertain the situation and get help because he doesn't have a radio or anything,” a BPD official said Tuesday.
Stephen Harlowe, the man behind the camera, said what upset him the most was that the officer refused to identify himself. When backup arrived, Harlowe said, police refused to take his statement or the statements of others who witnessed the incident.
Attorneys for Gurin said BPD gave a flawed report.
"Officer Barrett broke multiple rules of the Boston Police Department, three responding officers broke rules of the Boston Police Department, that is not what y’all heard in there, what you heard in there was Mr. Gurin might be a bad guy, that Mr. Harlowe might not be such an honest guy,” Gurin’s attorney said outside of court.
Boston police issued a report that shows only one witness account made it into the record. However, during the subsequent investigation seven witnesses were interviewed.
"The victim never came in to make out a complaint, this was self-initiated, it took him over five weeks for him to come in here for us to interview him, just to basically go over what happened here,” BPD officials said.
"To say that he didn't want to come forward, that he wasn't putting a complaint forward that is also entirely not the case,” Gurin’s attorney said.