Man says Dallas PD officer hit his vehicle, left the scene

Dallas police have opened an internal affairs investigation after FOX4 started asking about a man's claim that he was hit from behind by a DPD officer who then left the scene.

Terry Cunningham from Fort Worth was at a red light on the southbound 75 service road at Churchill Way when he asked a Dallas police officer waiting for the light to change where he could find a phone charger.

“He said that there's an Office Max right down here on Forest so we took off,” Cunningham said.

Cunningham said he moved over into the middle lane in front of the officer.

“I pull up, I’m sitting here like this behind another car, about this amount of time, boom he hits me,” Cunningham said. “I look up in the rearview mirror and see it’s the Dallas officer that I was just talking to so I put it in park and get out.”

Cunningham said both asked each other if they were okay.

“He says, ‘So we're cool?’ and I said, ‘Yeah, I’m cool’ meaning, you know, I’m fine personally, physically,” Cunningham said. “I go and get in my truck and the light turns green and he does me like this telling me to go so I pull over into Office Max and as I’m pulling in this parking lot I notice he's going down the service road to get on the freeway.”

Cunningham said he couldn’t believe the officer was leaving the scene and he called 911, telling the dispatcher: "Homeboy got in his f****** car and left."

Cunningham said four units responded including a supervisor and the officer who hit him. The supervisor said he believed it was just a misunderstanding the officer left since he thought everything was fine.

The damage was minor to Cunningham’s 2007 Nissan Titan, mostly to his trailer hitch and some bumper damage. Cunningham claims officers asked him what he wanted to do.

Cunningham said he wanted an accident report so he could get his truck fixed. But he said the officer was worried about his driving record and he was “two points away from not being able to drive for two years or something like that.”

FOX4 has since learned that the accident investigator put the damage at less than $1,000. Since no one was hurt, no accident report was generated and that's why Cunningham couldn’t get one.

However, there should have been information given to him on how to file a claim against the city -- that didn’t happen either.

After FOX4 contacted Dallas PD on Wednesday, Cunningham was contacted by officers beginning their investigation.