The Baltimore Police Department has fired an officer who was convicted last month of second-degree assault and official misconduct for telling a teen, while his hands were near the teen’s neck, “I will choke you. I will kill you,” during an attempted arrest in April 2020.

Maxwell Dundore, a six-year veteran with the agency, was fired in a termination letter dated Tuesday, the department said Thursday. He was sentenced on Monday to 18 months of supervised probation for the offenses.

Dundore told the court during his Monday sentencing that he planned to find employment outside of law enforcement. He also said he was “apologetic” for how he’d conducted himself.

Maryland law says a department leader must fire a police officer convicted of a felony. Dundore, however, was convicted of two misdemeanor offenses.

The same state law says a police leader “may” terminate the employment of an officer who is convicted of a misdemeanor that takes place while he is performing police duties, convicted of misdemeanor second-degree assault or convicted of a misdemeanor involving dishonor, fraud, theft or misrepresentation.

Dundore’s attorney, Natalie Finegar, did not respond to a request for comment Thursday. She said earlier this week that Dundore would appeal the ruling and would ask the court to consider probation before judgment in one year. She also requested a new trial.

Baltimore Circuit Judge Gregory Sampson in March found Dundore guilty of the misdemeanor offenses, calling the threat he made to the teen “so far out of bounds” that it was corrupt behavior. Sampson also found Dundore deliberately pushed the teen’s face after he was handcuffed. He disagreed with prosecutors’ contention that Dundore intentionally kicked the teen and that the officer’s takedown was a “body slam.”

“I expect criminals to act like criminals. I don’t expect police officers to act like criminals,” Sampson said during his March ruling.

At that time, Dundore was on administrative reassignment with Baltimore Police, pending an internal police investigation, Baltimore Police said. In fiscal year 2021-22, he collected $77,081, according to a city salary database.

Finegar’s latest motion for a new trial was based in part on the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office’s move to dismiss the case against Dundore’s then-supervisor, Brendan O’Leary. O’Leary, she said, had been unable to testify in Dundore’s trial when he had pending criminal charges in connection with the same incident.

But since prosecutors dropped his charges, she said, O’Leary could provide “substantive” evidence that Dundore’s actions didn’t constitute official misconduct. She said he would testify he would have recommended counseling for Dundore’s language during the arrest.

O’Leary’s charges were dropped after a “material witness was federally indicted” and not available for O’Leary’s trial in April, according to James Bentley, a spokesman for the state’s attorney. He had been accused of making a false statement and misconduct in office based on alleged discrepancies in a report about Dundore’s use of force.

Baltimore Police spokeswoman Lindsey Eldridge said Wednesday that O’Leary is still on administrative duty, with suspended police powers, pending the outcome of an ongoing internal investigation.

Dundore’s attorneys argued during the trial that Dundore’s statement was not a threat, but a defensive tactic, and that his contact with the teen’s head was an attempt to move him out of his path to stand up.

However, the prosecutor, Assistant State’s Attorney Ernest Reitz said Dundore’s language and actions showed he had “lost it,” and that a police officer should never threaten to choke or kill someone.

Body camera footage played in court showed a minutes-long scuffle in which the teen resisted attempts to handcuff him by squirming and kicking. Dundore, for some time, had his hands in the area of the teen’s jaw as he struggled, during which time he said, “I will choke you. I will kill you.” He also used profanity, the only officer at the scene to do so.

A report from the city’s consent decree monitoring team found in a review of years of police force incidents that Baltimore officers are using force less often and largely follow policies when they do, but that too many serious uses of force were not appropriate. In those serious instances, the department failed to identify and address the issues, according to a report released in December.