Rochester, NY — The Rochester police department is no stranger to controversy. Over the years, their officers have been recorded killing people with hoods over their heads, pepper spraying toddlers, beating people to death, and tormenting young children. Now, they can add harassing and kidnapping an EMT to their long list of bad behaviors.

A Rochester cop has been put on desk duty and is currently under investigation after he was captured on video assaulting and subsequently arresting an EMT as she unloaded a patient in a medical emergency. The officer’s justification for the act? The EMT accidentally dinged his car door while she was unloading the patient.

For some reason, the officer had parked his car in the emergency unloading area at the hospital which is only authorized for ambulances. When the ambulance drove up to unload the patient, the officer chose not to move his car and instead left it in the way of EMTs.

As the EMT unloaded the patient, the door to the ambulance accidentally dinged the police vehicle. Instead of realizing that this was an accident, facilitated by the officer blocking the emergency entrance, the cop lost his mind.

Before the EMT could even offload her patient, the officer tried to detain her. She had a patient in a medical emergency — who needed to get into the hospital — and this officer began hindering that progress, putting the patient’s life at risk, because the ambulance door dinged his car.

The EMT agreed to cooperate with the officer, but only after she transported the patient inside. But the officer seemingly couldn’t have cared less about the life of the patient and instead demanded the EMTs ID.

The EMT insisted on bringing the patient into the hospital before showing her ID and her care for the patient’s wellbeing infuriated the cop who then followed her in before assaulting her.

As the officer demanded her ID, the EMT continued to the check-in desk to get her patient the help he needed. As she checked in the patient, the officer assaulted her, grabbing her arm and twisting it behind her back before slamming her into the counter, forcibly handcuffing her and dragging her outside.

That officer then placed the EMT under arrest before hauling her off to jail.

In a phone call with News 10, the Rochester police department announced that the officer has been placed on leave and “at the direction of Chief Smith, the professional standards section is currently conducting an internal investigation.”

After the video was released, the EMT was swarmed with praise and support and the ambulance company put out the following statement over the weekend:

“Monroe Ambulance leadership and employees sincerely appreciate the outpouring of support through social media for our highly valued employee that was put in an untenable situation. We steadfastly stand by her prioritization of the care for her patient and are blessed by your willingness to publicly support her patient advocacy.

We would, however, appreciate resisting derogatory comments against RPD as an organization. This incident was perpetrated by a single individual and subject to investigation by his employer, everyone is entitled to due process regardless of opinion. We trust that the matter will be disposed of appropriately and responsibly.

In addition to commendation of our medic for focusing on attending to her patient despite the turmoil, we would also like to publicly acknowledge the Gates Ambulance EMT that stepped up/stepped in to assist her subsequent to detainment of her partner to ensure our patient was treated appropriately and responsibly.

Pending approval by the Gates EMT, we will publicly acknowledge her exemplary behavior in response to a patient and fellow provider in need regardless of the patch on her arm. Thank you both so much for your professionalism in the midst of chaos.”

Below is that video:

Article posted with permission from Matt Agorist