'Mission: Impossible' actor Ving Rhames says police pulled a gun on him in his own home

"Mission: Impossible - Fallout" actor Ving Rhames says California police officers pulled their guns on him inside his own home after a neighbor reported a "large black man" breaking in.

Rhames, 59, recalled the harrowing experience at his Santa Monica home on The Clay Cane Show on Sirius XM Friday when asked about racism.

“I open the door … there’s a red dot pointed at my face from a 9 mm, and they say, ‘Put up your hands!’ ” the actor said during the interview.

The incident, which occurred on July 29, 2016, started when his neighbor called 911, thinking a burglary was taking place, the Santa Monica Police Department confirmed.

The actor was home watching ESPN in nothing but basketball shorts before he came face to face with a gun, he said.

Rhames followed police instructions and opened his front door with one hand as they pointed a firearm at him. The actor, who kept his hands in the air, was escorted outside and surrounded by two additional police officers, the captain of police and a police dog.

The standoff ended after one of the officers recognized Rhames – not for his Golden Globe Award-winning work, but because their sons played basketball against each other in high school.

Rhames said the officers apologized, but he still had unanswered questions on why this happened.

"Santa Monica Public Safety Dispatch received several calls from residents of a possible residential burglary," Santa Monica police said Saturday in a statement. "The reporting parties indicated a black male was seen entering a residence and did not live there."

Rhames went across the street with police to confront the neighbor, who denied it, he said.

The police statement did not mention weapons, but said the altercation was "de-escalated with no use of force occurring."

In response to this incident, the Santa Monica Police Department launched the "Meet Your Neighbors" program, to encourage residents to become acquainted with each other to prevent such a situation from happening again.

The actor escaped the situation unharmed, but he says it could have been much worse, even deadly.

“My problem is, what if it was my son and he had a video-game remote or something, and you thought it was a gun? Just like … Trayvon had a bag of Skittles,” said Rhames, referring to Trayvon Martin, the teenager gunned down in Florida by a neighborhood patrol watchman in 2012.

He added: “There's so many incidents of where this happens.”

In the past few months, a woman called police on a black man wearing socks in the community pool in Memphis, Tennessee. In San Francisco, a woman called 911 on a young black girl selling water in front of her home. A CVS manager in Chicago called police on a black woman after an argument about a coupon. And police were called on an Oregon lawmaker who was going door-to-door to talk with constituents because she was acting "suspicious."

WSOC