An Erie County man whose videos involving Dunkirk police officers resulted in apparent threats to the department said he does not condone violence and is not anti-police.

Daniel Warmus, who regularly posts videos of his interactions with police departments in Western New York on YouTube, also believes the Dunkirk Police Department is exaggerating claims of threats in order to deny a request for documents and body camera footage.

“I think they’re being spiteful,” Warmus said in regards to a letter by Dunkirk Police Chief David Ortolano, who stated that one of two videos the Alden, N.Y., man posted under “Auditing Erie County” on YouTube in September resulted in threatening messages directed at the department and its officers.

Ortolano’s letter to Warmus, included in a complaint filed against the city of Dunkirk, states:

“After the first video posting by Mr. Warmus and the group of followers there have been several threats made toward our facilities, our officers and statements made that they will wait in the parking lot and follow our officers home. Due to this threat to the safety of our officers, facilities and families there is an ongoing open investigation and there will be no information released.”

In a follow up interview, Ortolano said, “The safety of our officers, their families and this facility are the top priority for me.”

Warmus had filed a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request with the department, seeking official officer complaint procedures, a copy of the form utilized for officer complaints, body camera footage from a sergeant of the Dunkirk Police Department from Aug. 26, 2021, and disciplinary files of the sergeant and another officer.

The FOIL request, which was eventually denied, followed two videos Warmus uploaded Sept. 9 in which he filmed Dunkirk police vehicles then officers who questioned him. The YouTube page has numerous videos involving interactions with police and each receive thousands of views and dozens of comments from those who watch them online.

Warmus, in an interview this week, stressed he is not “anti-police” and does not believe in “defunding the police,” a notion popularized during the George Floyd protests in 2020 that money for police departments should be reallocated to other agencies funded by local municipalities.

“I’m not anti-police. I would never condone someone calling (police) and threatening them,” said Warmus, who noted that he has deleted comments on YouTube that he believes are inappropriate.

He said the videos are meant to hold government bodies, including police agencies and town boards, accountable and to access documents available to the public.

“Do I think someone called and threatened their lives? No I don’t — I think there’s more to it,” Warmus said. He also alluded to a “discord between police and the public,” but said there are good police officers, many of whom he encounters while filming police vehicles and officers outside their departments with his cell phone.

Warmus also dismissed notions that he is trying to create confrontations by recording officers and uploading the videos to the internet. “My intentions are to never, ever create a confrontation,” he said.

In May, the FBI filed a criminal complaint against Warmus for entering the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. during the Jan. 6 attack. He is facing charges of violent and unlawful entry, disrupting government business and disorderly conduct.

Warmus said he could not discuss the federal charges.