Baltimore Police officer indicted on attempted-murder charges after viral chase video

Dan Belson

The Baltimore Sun

November 12, 2025

A grand jury has indicted a Baltimore police officer on attempted murder charges after a video was posted online showing the officer using his police vehicle to chase a man on foot, prosecutors said Wednesday.

Officer Robert A. Parks is also charged with first- and second-degree assault, reckless driving and misconduct in office.

If convicted of those charges, Parks faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in prison, Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates said during a news conference at his office. Parks is in custody after turning himself in on Wednesday. His case was not available in online court records as of Wednesday afternoon.

Bates called Parks’ actions “completely unacceptable.”

“Sometimes you see something that’s just so egregious that you cannot understand how an individual would have placed himself in that position at that moment in time,” Bates said. “That was just my personal interpretation.”

Parks was stripped of his police powers Oct. 29 after a video surfaced of him first talking with a group of men in Central Park Heights before entering his car and driving erratically toward one of them.

While driving across a grassy area, his car hit the man, Bates said. The officer proceeded down a dirt road and crashed into a chain-link fence in a backyard. The next day, after pressure from the Office of the Public Defender and other critics, the department identified the officer from the video as Parks.

Prosecutors believe that Parks approached the group at around 5 p.m. on Oct. 28, shortly before one of the men recorded the encounter, near Wylie Liquors Bar on the 3100 block of Wylie Avenue. One of the men had a misdemeanor warrant, according to Bates.

Parks told them, “it’s getting a little hot, guys. I… just need you guys to take a lap, you know,” and the group walked away, the indictment says. Parks got back into his patrol vehicle and drove on Wylie toward the first person who left the liquor store corner, and called him by name.

That’s around where the video starts. “Don’t make it worse. I’m going to be straight up with you,” Parks said, according to the indictment. The man replied “No,” turned and walked away. Parks responded by saying “All right, I’m gonna call the dogs and come get you,” the indictment reads.

Parks then got into his police vehicle and proceeded to chase the man. Bates said Parks used his vehicle as a “weapon” when he steered his vehicle directly at the man.

Shortly after the video went viral, Mayor Brandon Scott and Police Commissioner Richard Worley both repudiated the officer’s actions and said that there would be an internal affairs investigation. Meanwhile, Bates said his office also would investigate the matter.

Parks, who has spent five years with the department, was initially placed on administrative duties, though a police spokesperson said Tuesday that he was later suspended without pay.

Anne Arundel County-based defense attorney Peter O’Neill, who speculated Tuesday that Parks’ loss of pay suggested he had been indicted, said that “one could argue” that driving a motor vehicle into a human being shows “an intent to take the life of the individual,” constituting attempted murder.

He also said that “countless defendants” are charged with first-degree assault in connection with similar actions where an officer is on foot and a fleeing suspect is in a vehicle.

“Based on the video I saw, I’m not surprised,” he said Wednesday when told about the charges against Parks.

“When individuals have tried to have their cars run toward police officers, we’ve held them accountable and charged them with these types of charges,” Bates said. “I think it’s important that everybody understands it doesn’t matter if you’re police or civilian, that the law must treat everybody the same, and that’s what we make sure we try to do in our office.”

In Maryland, the main difference between attempted first- and second-degree murder is premeditation. To convict someone of attempted second-degree murder, the state has to prove the defendant took a “substantial step, beyond mere preparation,” toward the commission of murder in the second degree, had the apparent ability to do so at the time and actually intended to kill, according to the Maryland Criminal Pattern Jury Instructions.

The statute for first-degree assault, meanwhile, says that a person who “intentionally cause[s] or attempt[s] to cause serious physical injury to another” is guilty.

State law also mandates that police chiefs terminate the employment of any officer convicted of a felony.

“If convicted, the officer will be fired immediately, in accordance with the law,” Scott said in a statement released after Bates announced the indictment.

“This officer’s actions were unacceptable, and completely at odds with how we expect our public servants to act,” Scott said. “We are thankful to our partners in the State’s Attorney’s office for their work, and will be closely following the outcome of this trial.”