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Alex Cabrero Reporting"I was defenseless. I was trying to protect myself."
What began as a fun basketball game at a gym turned into a nightmare for one man. Now he's suing Salt Lake City for a million dollars.
He claims an off-duty Salt Lake City police officer beat him up and pointed a shotgun at him while the officer's friends watched. Now the man says he's having flashbacks and fears for his life.
The man is from war-torn Kosovo, where he says police officers and soldiers shoot people all the time for no reason. Agim, who doesn't want us to use his last name, came to the United States to get away from all that. Then he met Salt Lake City police officer Marcus Barrett and it all came back.
Officer, 911 Call: "Get out here ______. You're _______ with the wrong people, all right? Get out."
Agim: "Don't touch me."
Officer: "Get out. Get out.
It's the kind of yelling and cursing police officers usually do in the movies, but for Agim, it was real.
Agim: "Just started trying hitting me while I was inside the car."
Agim says it all started because during a basketball game at a West Valley Gold's Gym, he stole the basketball from Marcus Barrett, a Salt Lake City police officer.
Agim: "He swung at me and then we wrestled to the ground."
Other players broke it up and Agim left, but he says when he got into his car, Barrett and two of his friends blocked him in and started making threats. He got real scared when he says Barrett got out of his patrol car and took a shotgun out of his trunk.
Agim: "Pulls out the shotgun, loads it, points, and is like, ‘Open the window.'"
Agim called 911 on his cell phone; dispatch recorded the whole thing.
Officer, 911 Call: "Let me explain something, okay? You know who i am? I don't. ***, you see that *** car right there?"
Agim: "Yeah."
Officer: "What does that make me?"
Agim: "A cop."
Officer: "A police officer."
Agim: "He grabbed my arm and tried to yank me out of the window. He was pulling me. I have scratches all around my arm and all around my wrists."
Eventually, West Valley police arrived to sort things out. Now Agim's attorney is asking Barrett, Salt Lake City and Salt Lake City's police department for a million dollars in damages.
Clark Newhall, Agim's Attorney: "There is nothing that will erase this from his mind. Nothing."
The Salt Lake City police department and Officer Barrett aren't talking about this case. In West Valley's police report, though, Barrett claims Agim has his own friends who were threatening to start a fight and he only got out his shotgun for to protect himself.
The city has 90 days to respond to Agim's request or a lawsuit will be filed.
