SYRACUSE,N.Y. -- A road-rage shooter got favorable treatment from police and prosecutors because he's a

former cop

, the victim said today.

Robert Tifft told Syracuse.com that Mark J. Miller should not have been allowed to plead guilty to just a misdemeanor over the Dec. 2 shooting near Interstate 481 in Cicero.

"If you got connections, you got connections," Tifft said. "But the law is the law. You got all these gangbangers shooting the streets up. If they see this guy getting a slap on the hand, what do you think's gonna happen now?"

Miller, 49, is a former MP, Oswego city police officer and Veterans Administration police officer, according to his ex-wife.

Tifft, 42, said he wasn't notified by police or prosecutors that Miller was scheduled to plead guilty to reckless endangerment this morning in Cicero Town Court.

"They wouldn't even give me the guy's name," Tifft said.

District Attorney William Fitzpatrick denied the claim that Miller got favorable treatment.

"No special treatment, nothing unusual, just the system operating the way it's supposed to operate," he said.

The sheriff's office chose to have the DA's office review the case rather than charge Miller soon after the shooting, Fitzpatrick said.

"This case presented an arguable self-defense claim and with the defendant not presenting a clear and present danger to the public, the sheriff opted to have us review it," he said.

The DA also charged that Tifft was notified that Miller was being charged and that Tifft and his lawyers agreed the misdemeanor charge was appropriate.

Tifft was on his way to his job at Agrana Fruit in Baldwinsville around 5:15 p.m. Dec. 2 when the road he was on narrowed from two lanes to one because of construction, he said. He started to merge to the right.

"Then this car, I don't know what the hell his problem is, but he was trying to get around me," Tifft said. The other driver, Miller, was trying to keep Tifft from merging in front of him, Tifft said.

"So I'm right at the cones, ready to get into the lane, I already had the right-of-way," he said. "He comes squeezing by me and makes me swerve. I almost hit the cones."

Miller was ahead of him until they came to a traffic light on Circle Drive, at the intersection of the ramp to I-481, Tifft said. Their cars were side-by-side at the light, with Tifft on Miller's right.

"I'm looking over and I'm pissed off," Tifft said. "I look at this guy and he's giving me the finger and saying stuff."

Tifft got out of his car and opened Miller's passenger side door.

"I say, 'What the hell is your problem?' and this and that," Tifft said. "I was swearing. I wasn't cool and calm about it. I was pissed."

That's when he saw the gun at Miller's right hip, Tifft said. It appeared to be a 9mm handgun with "Desert Storm" on the grip, he said.

"I was like, 'Wait a minute, man,'" he said. "Then he cocked it. He cocked the gun."

Tifft put up his hands and said, "Wait! Wait! Wait!" he said. As he turned to his left to back away, Miller fired one shot that caught Tifft in the right armipit area, Tifft said. The shot knocked him to the ground.

Tifft heard Miller stall his car, then start it and speed away, he said.

"He peeled out, like he was in a hurry to get the hell out of there," Tifft said. He at first thought he'd caught on fire -- that's how much the gunshot burned, he said. As he lay on the ground, he was afraid for his life.

"Especially after took off," Tifft said. "He didn't know if I was dead or alive. I'm on the ground and he's peeling off."

A woman motorist shouted to Tifft that the shooter had left and to get into his car, he said. He told her to call 911.

Miller told sheriff's investigators that he thought Tifft had something in his hand when he opened the car door. Tifft denies that.

"I didn't have nothing," he said. "I had my hands clenched like I wanted punch him, if I could've reached him. But I didn't have anything."

The gunshot caught Tifft in a rib and went up into the middle of his back, he said. Doctors told him it just missed a lung, he said.

Miller, who refused to comment to Syracuse.com, told police he not intend to shoot Tifft. Miller's scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday.

After the shooting, sheriff's deputies impounded the car Tifft was driving, which belonged to his girlfriend, he said. They would not return it for 22 days, he said. They never told him why, he said.

"When we got it back, it was all tore to shreds," Tifft said. "They had it looking like a garbage dump, like they thought I had hid something in there."

Tifft has hired a lawyer and plans to sue Miller, he said.

Contact John O'Brien anytime | email | Twitter | 315-470-2187 Reporter Douglass Dowty contributed to this story.