CURTIS BAY, Md. (AP) — A 15-year-old is dead after officers responding to a child custody dispute in Maryland found the teen unresponsive and the teen’s stepfather, a police officer, was taken into custody after police said he tried to disarm an officer.
Anne Arundel County police officers met the teen’s mother, who was in the area to pick up her son, who had been with his stepfather, county police said in a news release Wednesday.
The stepfather, Eric Banks Jr., 34, told officers that the teen left without his belongings, but he was found unresponsive in an upstairs bedroom of the Curtis Bay home.
The teen was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said. The cause and manner of death are pending examination by the medical examiner.
Banks, a Baltimore police officer, became combative and tried to disarm an officer, county police said. Several officers responded and took Banks into custody. Police obtained an arrest warrant charging Banks with first- and second-degree assault, reckless endangerment, disarm a law officer and other offences.
Banks’ police powers were already suspended and he will now be suspended without pay while county police investigate, Baltimore police said.
It’s not clear whether Banks has an attorney.
