Literally the LAST thing a police officer needs to joke about right now.

Cobb County police officer Lt. Greg Abbott has been accused of making racist statements to a woman during a traffic stop, telling her the police “only kill black people.”

During dashcam video of the incident, a woman in the passenger seat –who is white – told the officer she didn’t want to reach for the cell phone in her lap because she’d seen too many videos of cops shooting motorists.

“But you’re not black,” the officer interrupted. “Remember, we only kill black people. Yeah, we only kill black people, right? All the videos you’ve seen, have you seen black people get killed? You have.”

Watch below.

Via Washington Post:

The department said the officer was placed on administrative duties during an internal investigation.

Abbott’s attorney, Lance LoRusso, said Abbott, a 27-year veteran on the force, is fully cooperating.

“His comments must be observed in their totality to understand their context,” LoRusso said in the statement Thursday to The Washington Post. “He was attempting to de-escalate a situation involving an uncooperative passenger. In context, his comments were clearly aimed at attempting to gain compliance by using the passenger’s own statements and reasoning to avoid making an arrest.”

But the police chief said there was no excuse.

“No matter what the context, statements like these are unacceptable and are not indicative of the type of culture we are trying to facilitate here in the police department, as well as within the county,” he said in a statement.

(Featured image via WSBTV news video)