Was he holding the gun or pointing the gun?
That’s the question before a Lehigh County jury Tuesday as the trial of Christopher Fitzgerald, son of Allentown police Chief Joel Fitzgerald, gets underway at the county courthouse.
Fitzgerald, 23, of Philadelphia is standing trial this week on charges of simple assault and reckless endangerment. Prosecutors say he aimed a loaded handgun at two undercover county detectives Aug. 29, following an alleged road-rage incident that began in Allentown and ended with a tense standoff in Whitehall Township.
Fitzgerald, through his attorney Jack McMahon, said he never pointed the weapon at the detectives but was holding it for protection because he feared for his family’s safety. Fitzgerald’s girlfriend and 1-year-old son were in the car.
The trial in Allentown is expected to draw a crowd, and court officials are taking precautions. In a court order handed down last week, Judge Kelly L. Banach ruled that cellphones will be confiscated at the courtroom door, and spectators are not permitted to congregate in the hallway.
Banach’s order states that journalists are barred from interviewing people at the courthouse during the trial, and must conduct interviews across the street.
The prosecutor will be Steven M. Luksa, the county’s first assistant district attorney.
According to police, county detectives Christopher Cruz and Todd Frey were driving to an undercover investigation shortly after 4 p.m. and their car was behind Fitzgerald’s car on Greenleaf Street in Allentown.
The vehicles remained in those positions as they continued on North Seventh Street, which becomes MacArthur Road in Whitehall, court records say.
The detectives were not in uniform and were driving an unmarked car. They say Fitzgerald “brake-checked” them several times, then stopped in the middle of MacArthur Road, nearly causing a crash.
Fitzgerald then opened his car door, the detectives said, and pointed a black handgun at them. The detectives “thought they were about to be shot,” court records state, and put their car in reverse to get away.
Fitzgerald, who was driving his girlfriend to work at a restaurant near the Lehigh Valley Mall, was pulled over in the parking lot of an appliance store near the mall. His arrest was caught on bystander video that will likely be played in court.
McMahon is expected to offer the jury a slightly different version of what happened.
He said Fitzgerald had no idea the men in the car were cops, so he grabbed his Glock handgun out of the glove box for protection when he saw one of them coming toward his car. Fitzgerald said his client never aimed the gun at the detectives.
Fitzgerald, who worked as a corrections officer at the Lehigh County Jail, had a valid permit to carry a weapon. He was fired soon after the arrest.
Shortly after Fitzgerald was charged, McMahon said he believed his client was the victim of racial profiling. District Attorney Jim Martin called a news conference to dispute the lawyer’s statements, saying he feared they could lead to unrest in the city.
Joel Fitzgerald was appointed chief in December 2013 and had been on the job less than a year when his son was arrested. He has only commented publicly once about the case, telling The Morning Call in August that he was standing by Christopher.
“My son has been raised by police officers and respects law enforcement. It is very difficult for me to believe that he would do anything to harm a police officer. I don’t know what happened, but I think there is more to this story than what we’re hearing so far. I for one will withhold judgment until he has his day in court,” he said.
McMahon said last month there’s no chance Christopher Fitzgerald would accept a plea deal.
“He’s innocent,” McMahon said. “He was merely a guy driving his wife to work with a baby in the car that day. He didn’t do anything wrong. You shouldn’t plead guilty when you didn’t do anything wrong.”
Barring any last-minute pretrial motions, jury selection will begin at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday.
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