A New Orleans Police Department patrol officer turned himself in Saturday morning after deputies say he pulled his department-issued firearm on his roommate during an argument at his Slidell home earlier this month. Derrick Burmaster, 47, was booked at the St. Tammany Parish Correctional Center on one count of aggravated assault with a firearm.
The St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office obtained the arrest warrant after its Persons Crimes Unit investigated the Oct. 2 confrontation, according to WGNO. The station reported that Burmaster pulled out his NOPD-issued firearm during the argument at his Slidell residence, which it placed in the 3300 block of Bellwick Bay Avenue, while WDSU identified the location as the 3300 block of Bellwick Bay Drive. WDSU additionally reported that Burmaster's bond was set at $15,000.
Officer Booked After Turning Himself In
Burmaster surrendered at the correctional center on the morning of Saturday, Oct. 17, and was booked on the assault charge, per the same WGNO report. Under Louisiana's aggravated-assault-with-a-firearm statute, a conviction can carry a fine of up to $10,000, up to 10 years imprisonment with or without hard labor, or both, according to the Louisiana Legislature.
A History That Predates This Arrest
This isn't Burmaster's first brush with scrutiny over his use of force. Court records show he fatally shot a dog in 2012 while grabbing his crotch for protection, and in 2021 he fired three rounds at a 16-week-old Catahoula puppy named Apollo while responding to a noise complaint in New Orleans' Lower Garden District, according to a Midpage reproduction of the federal case Brown v. Burmaster. One of the bullets struck Apollo in the back of the neck, and shrapnel from another round struck a fellow officer, John Roussel, in the hand, the court filing states.
NOPD's Public Integrity Bureau initially determined the shooting of Apollo was unjustified, though a later department hearing panel exonerated Burmaster on improper-use-of-force charges while sustaining a separate uniform-policy violation, per the same court document. Apollo's owners sued Burmaster and the city of New Orleans in 2022, and the Fifth Circuit affirmed the denial of Burmaster's bid for qualified immunity in a January 2025 opinion, according to the filing. Plaintiffs in that case alleged Burmaster had accumulated at least thirty reported excessive-force incidents over a ten-year span at NOPD, the document states.
Part of a Broader Pattern in Department Records
Burmaster's case is not an isolated data point. New Orleans police records cited in court filings documented 11 fatal animal shootings by department officers between 2012 and 2022, according to The Independent. That history has resurfaced as Burmaster now faces an unrelated criminal charge involving a firearm, this time pointed not at an animal but allegedly brandished during a dispute inside his own home.
