Incident CRP-19-29

Incident Description

From the Fairfax County Police Civilian Review Panel:

"This report concerns a citizen complaint related to an interaction between the citizen (Complainant) and a Fairfax County police officer in a parking lot. The incident began when the officer, while driving his patrol car, observed the Complainant as the officer drove past him. The officer followed the Complainant into the parking lot of the Complainant’s apartment building and questioned the Complainant. The officer’s questions focused on whether the

Complainant lived in the apartment complex.

The complaint alleges that racial profiling was the impetus for this conversation, and that the Complainant had done nothing wrong. The Complainant maintained that he should have never been approached by the officer

The Fairfax County Police Department (FCPD) investigated the incident and ultimately agreed with the Complainant that the officer had no reasonable suspicion to suspect that the Complainant had violated a law or was in the process of committing a crime. The FCPD concluded that the Complainant had every right to not answer the officer’s questions.... At the time [2019], the officer had been with the FCPD for approximately six years and was assigned as a detective in the Reston Criminal Investigations section of the FCPD."