Ray Albers, the police lieutenant who told protestors in Ferguson, Mo. to “go fuck” themselves, resigned from the St. Ann, Mo. police department on Thursday, after he was presented with the option of being fired or resigning, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
The incident that spurred the evaluation of the lieutenant’s behavior was caught on camera and showed Albers aiming his rifle at protestors before saying: “I will fucking kill you.” In response, protestors asked for his name whereupon he continued his incendiary barrage of comments, saying: “Go fuck yourself.”
After the incident, the ACLU campaigned to get Albers removed from active duty, a request that was discussed and agreed upon during a meeting this week of the city’s board of police commissioners, the newspaper reported.
Police Chief Aaron Jiminez told the Post-Dispatch that he wasn’t “condoning his behavior whatsoever” but defended Albers’ action of pointing his gun at protestors, saying it was “totally justifiable.” According to Jiminez, water and urine were thrown at Albers and he reportedly saw one of the protestors carrying a gun.
Jiminez added that Albers’ comments were caused by fear and noted that there were “a whole bunch of what you’d call citizen journalists, who were sitting with cameras recording, waiting for something stupid to happen, which they got. They won on this one.”
Watch footage of the officer, courtesy of YouTube:
h/t Mediaite