A pregnant mother and her eight-year-old son have been left shaken after they were mistakenly pulled over by police at gunpoint in California.
Shanice Stewart was driving her young son, Brandon, to football practice at around 5pm on 17 October when police officers pulled her over, with a helicopter hovering above her vehicle, according to KCRA.
Police officers in Sacramento allegedly thought that her young son was a teenager they were looking for who was wanted for two felonies.
“Really? My eight-year-old baby fits the description of the suspect you’re looking for?” Ms Stewart told KCRA. “It just didn’t make sense to me.”
Ms Stewart initially thought that it was a traffic stop and pulled up on the side of the freeway and rolled all her windows down, according to a post she shared on Facebook.
“I immediately broke down because I didn’t know or understand what was going on," she told ABC7.
She claimed that the freeway was put to a complete stop behind her and she was instructed to throw her car keys out the window and get out of the car slowly.
The pregnant mother said that one police officer then saw that the young boy was not the person they were looking for and apologised.
In video footage captured by a passerby and shared by Ms Stewart, the eight-year-old was heard screaming in desperation at the officers.
Ms Stewart wrote that her son was “screaming for my safety,” trying to tell officers that his “mom was just taking me to practice.”
She said that she was fearful the police officer was going to “shoot him” because the officer allegedly kept repeating to the mother that the child fit the description of who they were looking for, and spotted him earlier when the pair were getting in their car.
Ms Stewart is bewildered that the whole freeway was closed, multiple police officers were on the scene, and a helicopter ended up flying overhead, just because her young son matched a description.
Police told ABC News that they misidentified Brandon through helicopter surveillance as he and his mother left for football practice.
Brandon has reportedly been left traumatised from the incident— (KRCA)
He allegedly matched the description due to his hair and the colour of his clothing, police said.
Police said in a statement to the outlet that they initiated a “high-risk stop” because the suspect they were looking for had a history with firearms.
They said they ended the stop when they realised that the boy was not who they were looking for.
“We must acknowledge that a case of mistaken identity occurred,” police said in the statement to The Independent.
“Our officers provided an explanation and an apology to the mother and her son. Our department has been in contact with the mother since the incident. We recognise the impact that police interactions can have on our community members.”
According to police, the suspect they are after is still at large.
Ms Stewart told ABC News that this has been a “life-changer” for both of them.
Brandon now asks his mother to take a street route instead of the freeway and only sits in the back seat, where he feels safer.
When a police car drives past, he tells his mother to drive carefully.
