ROCHESTER HILLS (WXYZ) — "I wasn't pretending to be a police officer," Christian Mansoor told 7 Action News outside his home in Macomb Township.
Mansoor, 18, is facing a misdemeanor charge of impersonating a police officer after investigators with the Oakland County Sheriff said he tried to conduct a traffic stop in his silver BMW that has flashing red and blue lights on it.
It happened late Monday night in the area of M-59 and Crooks Road in Rochester Hills.
Mansoor told 7 Action News reporter Kimberly Craig that it wasn't that he was trying to stop the female driver, but rather she just didn't stop. And he claims he didn't put the lights on the vehicle.
"I bought a government auction vehicle and it had red flashing lights in the front of it," he said.
Craig asked Mansoor why he would turn the flashing lights on in an attempt to stop anyone. He replied, "Because she was going 100 miles an hour."
What Mansoor could not have known is that the driver he allegedly tried to stop was a Waterford Police officer who was off-duty at the time. And she could tell something wasn't right about the vehicle.
"The first thing, obviously, a BMW, unless you're in Dubai, that's not a standard police car," Sheriff Michael Bouchard said.
When deputies located Mansoor, they said he was trying to remove the license plate off of his vehicle and he took off running but was quickly apprehended.
Bouchard said they are urging anyone who may have been stopped by Mansoor, thinking he was law enforcement, contact investigators. He said, "It's still unclear what his intentions were. Was that some kind of weird power trip? Was there some other nefarious purpose?"
Mansoor claimed that he didn't activate the light and that he didn't know they were on.
"People think I'm a rapist and I'm going to go rape little girls and (expletive). Like, really?" Mansoor said.
He has been released on a $5,000 personal bond.
