Off-duty police officer Michael Theriault admitted he punched Whitby man Dafonte Miller “as hard as he could” — causing catastrophic injuries to the young man’s eye — but did so in self-defence, fearing for his life.

“My intention was to disarm Mr. Miller,” the Toronto cop told a courtroom Tuesday within moments of sitting in the witness box, “so he could stop hitting me and my brother with that pole.”

Two weeks after his criminal trial began, Theriault, 27, gave his account of a Dec. 28, 2016 violent confrontation on a Whitby street that resulted in charges against him and his younger brother, a high-profile proceeding that has regularly filled an Oshawa courtroom.

The trial has heard conflicting accounts of the central aspects in the case, including what precipitated the violent confrontation that resulted in facial injuries to Miller, then 19, so severe that his left eye had to be removed.

Miller told the court last week that the eye injury occurred when he was struck in the face by Michael Theriault, who was wielding a long metal pipe that was later found at the scene.

But on the stand Tuesday, Theriault was adamant neither he nor his brother struck Miller with a weapon, but that it was Miller who was armed.

“Did you see anyone using the pipe that morning?” asked Michael Lacy, Michael Theriault’s lawyer, within a minute of his client taking the stand, saying he wanted to get right to the issue.

“Yes,” Michael Theriault said. “Mr. Miller.”

The claim prompted disbelieving laughter from the public gallery and a warning from Ontario Superior Court Justice Joseph Di Luca that such outbursts wouldn’t be tolerated.

Theriault and his younger brother are jointly charged with aggravated assault and separately charged with attempt to obstruct justice. Both have pleaded not guilty in the judge-alone trial.

In testimony last week, Miller told the court he was beaten by the Theriaults after they asked him and two friends what they were doing in the residential neighbourhood near the Theriault family home. When Miller and his friends walked away, he said, the brothers chased him down Erickson Drive.

On the stand, Theriault denied nearly all aspects of Miller’s account, admitting only that he’d repeatedly punched Miller “as hard as I could” in an attempt to disarm him and keep him from harming himself and his brother.

Acknowledging he caused Miller’s eye injury “with my fist,” Theriault said it was “absolutely not” his intention.

According to Michael Theriault’s account, he and his brother were smoking in the garage after a late night playing video games with their visiting uncle when they heard what sounded like the closing doors of their parents’ Ford F150 truck, parked in the driveway.

Michael Theriault told his brother to hit the automatic garage door opener, and as the door began opening, he said he rolled under and saw two people exiting the truck.

“I didn’t know if they were stealing stuff from it, or if they were going to hot-wire the truck,” Michael Theriault said, when asked what was going through his mind.

The two males who were in the truck began running, Michael Theriault said, prompting him and his brother to begin chasing one of the men down Erickson Drive. In between two houses, he said the man — who he now knows was Miller — attempted to hop or open a fence.

“I figured he was fleeing and didn’t want to get caught,” Theriault said.

Michael Theriault, who was then six foot two and approximately 210 pounds, said he “bodychecked” Miller to stop him from getting over the fence. It was right after that that he claims he began getting hit with something that he knew wasn’t a fist, Theriault said.

That’s when “all hell broke loose,” the officer said.

He began backing up and called out to his brother that Miller had a “bat,” saying at that point he didn’t know what the weapon was because it was dark. Michael Theriault then claimed his brother attempted to “engage” Miller but that he was struck on the side of the head with what he now knows was a pole.

The off-duty cop then said he applied his police training and knew that he should “close the distance” to try to disarm Miller, knowing the man wouldn’t be able to swing the weapon if he got close.

Michael Theriault testified he punched him “wherever I could” and “as hard as I could.” Eventually, he was able to “disarm” Miller, who soon after moved to knock on the front door of a nearby home. Theriault said he had grabbed the pipe so that Miller did not re-arm himself with it.

No one answered the door where Miller was knocking, and Michael Theriault said he was soon after able to get on top of Miller and control him, and then tossed the pipe he was holding out of the way.

In a forceful cross-examination by Crown lawyer Peter Scrutton, Michael Theriault was probed on his account and on various aspects of his decision-making on the day in question, including why — starting from first discovering the males breaking into the car, to fighting with Miller — he never identified himself as a police officer.

“How long does it take to say ‘Stop. Police?’ A second?”

“Very quick, sir,” Theriault said.

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“Wouldn’t saying “Stop, police’ assist you? That’s the sort of thing that you’re trained to do?” Scrutton asked.

Michael Theriault said it was, but repeatedly said he was only focused on apprehending Miller, and stressed that everything was happening so fast.

Scrutton questioned why Michael Theriault would rush toward unknown trouble — not knowing basic information including how many people were on the other side of the garage door, or whether they were armed — without any weapons or even, according to Michael Theriault’s evidence, shoes.

“You’re risking your own safety to pursue this, whatever theft it was?” Scrutton said of the alleged truck break in.

“Essentially yes,” Michael Theriault replied.

Scrutton suggested to the officer that he hadn’t in fact left the garage of their family home on Erickson Drive without a weapon, but had grabbed the pipe right before he “rolled out after the unknown people.”

“Absolutely not,” Michael Theriault said.

Scrutton also suggested that the officer had failed to tell Miller he was an officer because he hadn’t actually been intending to arrest Miller, but wanted to give him a beating, which Theriault denied.

After playing 911 calls placed by Christian Theriault and by Miller immediately after the fight, Scrutton asked why neither Christian or Michael Theriault — who speaks on both calls — told the dispatcher that they’d just had a violent encounter with an armed man and had been fighting for their lives. Instead, both tell the dispatcher about theft from the truck.

“You never say during this call, ‘I’ve got someone who was just hitting me with a weapon?’ ”

“That’s correct,” Michael Theriault said.

“And that’s not important information to communicate to officers who are responding . . . that you’ve been fighting for your life?" Scrutton asked.

Theriault answered that he would later tell this to police and stressed that he was focused on Miller.

During Michael Theriault’s testimony, the officer said that after he’d gotten control of Miller, he’d tossed the pole out of the way; an image of the pole taken by Durham Region police officers showed it landed in a snowy yard nearby.

Scrutton suggested to Theriault that he’d wanted to “disassociate” himself from the pipe.

“I’m going to suggest, sir, that you throw this pipe away . . . because you know that pipe is bad for you,” Scrutton said. “. . . You are actively trying to cover up your use of that pipe.”

“Not at all, sir,” Theriault said.

The trial will continue Jan. 29, when Crown and defence lawyers are scheduled to give closing submissions.