Warning: Video contains strong language.

A 911 call about a small child left outdoors alone, a man with a smart phone at the home where the child was staying, and a YouTube video that has already been watched more than 31,000 times have Wareham Police facing the threat of legal action.

Richard Phillips, who filmed the June 18 police response to a call about the child and about two men allegedly fighting in the front yard of 17 Camardo Drive, characterizes the officers’ action as unlawful entry and assault and battery on his 58-year-old mother.

“I told them, ‘You don’t have a warrant and you can’t come in the house,’ but they came in anyway,” Phillips said.

The video, which begins immediately as the door opens for police, shows Officer George Chandler waving to the camera as Officer Jon Verhagen steps into the house and tries to grab the camera. The contact with Phillips’ mother, Trudy, is not captured on the video but apparently occurred in the course of that grab.

By that evening the cell phone video had been uploaded onto YouTube, was featured on NECN, and had “gone viral” with web viewings around the world.

Wareham Police said the incident is under investigation and noted that officers had been called to 17 Camardo Drive, located in a subdivision off Cromesett Road, 31 times since 2011 for reasons ranging from general disturbances to suspicious activity. As of early this week both officers remained on duty.

Phillips said Wareham police officers initially came to the house that morning in response to an abandoned child call. After being told the child was actually in the house drinking strawberry milk, the cops wanted to verify that.

He said after verifying that the child was safe the officers said they received a second call stating two men were fighting on the front lawn of the house.

Phillips claims this was completely fabricated and that the only two men at the house were Phillips and his brother, who were putting in an air conditioning unit inside their mother’s house.

But according to Wareham Police, the department received a phone call from a neighbor on Camardo Drive (audio provided below) that two men were outside fighting on the lawn before returning inside the house and leaving the 3-year-old child outside unsupervised.

Phillips said the officers told him “We’re not leaving,” and that’s when he began filming.

“I think this is a case of police misconduct,” said Boston-based attorney Howard Friedman, who has been hired as legal counsel by Phillips. While no complaint against the town has been filed yet, Phillips said he plans on taking legal action.

“They have no right to slap a camera out of your hand because they don’t like being recorded,” Friedman said. “People have a right to record the police just like the press does. They wouldn’t have slapped a camera if it was a newscaster.”

Friedman said the police have an obligation to go and investigate a call, but in this case they overstayed their welcome.

“They had already done the investigation, at some point it’s time to say goodbye,” he said. “You can’t just keep bothering people.”

“Generally, when one is looking at whether something an officer has done is illegal because it constitutes police misconduct in this type of situation, you are going to have to ask whether the police officer used what is called ‘reasonable force’ when he was performing his duties,” said Attorney Adrienne Catherine Beauregard-Rheaume of New Bedford-based Beauregard, Burke, and Franco law firm.

Beauregard-Rheaume said her firm has handled several police misconduct cases over the years and represented police officers in civil service issues.

“A judge or a jury would have to look at all of the facts and circumstances, and decide whether that police officer was acting reasonably when he grabbed the phone and apparently made physical contact with the woman on the video,” she said. “If it’s not reasonable, then a police officer is liable to the same extent that anyone else would be.”

Phillips said he took his mother, who has a history of both heart and hip problems, to Tobey Hospital where she was quickly discharged, and then to St. Luke’s Hospital in New Bedford.

According to Phillips, the doctors at St. Luke’s kept her there until 3 a.m. Thursday morning monitoring her blood pressure, which Phillips said was 227/99 at one point.

The video shows Phillips calling Chandler “meek” multiple times, to which Phillips claims Chandler replied, “Wait until I see you without this badge. I’ll show you meek.”