General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAfter failing to get felony indictment, feds charge DC sandwich thrower with a misdemeanor
Piro loses again. This lady cannot indict a ham sandwich for a felony and so is going for a misdemeanor (where she does not have to go to a grand jury)
Link to tweet
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/after-failing-felony-indictment-feds-charge-dc-sandwich/story
Sean Dunn has now been charged through a criminal information, which did not require sign-off by a D.C. grand jury.
Prosecutors failed to convince a grand jury to charge Dunn with a felony, sources familiar with the matter confirmed to ABC News on Wednesday......
The incident came amid heightened tensions over federal law enforcement presence in the District after President Donald Trump deployed federal law enforcement agents and National Guard troops to Washington declaring a public safety emergency and putting the Metropolitan Police Department under partial federal oversight.
Dunn's attorney and the D.C. U.S. Attorney's Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.

bucolic_frolic
(52,203 posts)This guy has a strong case imho.
Deuxcents
(23,811 posts)Wiz Imp
(6,826 posts)this charge ultimately gets dismissed.
Arazi
(8,332 posts)LetMyPeopleVote
(169,179 posts)There are different ways of reading the stunning action by a Washington grand jury amid Trumps federal crackdown on the nations capital.
Link to tweet
https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/deadline-legal-blog/dc-sandwich-thrower-grand-jury-indictment-decline-matters-rcna227748
Its a stunning result with serious implications no matter what motivated the rejection. Yet, what those implications are, exactly, could depend on the rationale for refusing to approve a felony charge against the man who became a folk hero in D.C. amid the Trump administrations federal crackdown in the nations capital......
But something bigger may have been at play: jury nullification. Thats when jurors believe that prosecutors have proved the technical elements of the case but, nonetheless, the jury renders a moral objection by way of a not guilty verdict (or in the case of a grand jury, a no true bill).
To put the question one way: Did grand jurors think the government did a bad job, or a bad thing?.....
Importantly, we have more than Dunns case to go on in analyzing this phenomenon. Theres the even more shocking recent failure of D.C. prosecutors to get an indictment against Sidney Reid a whopping three times. She was initially charged under the same federal assault statute as Dunn. After striking out in the grand jury, prosecutors reduced her case to a misdemeanor, which doesnt require grand jury approval.
Lets assume for a moment that grand jurors in both the Dunn and Reid cases just thought there wasnt enough proof to charge them with felonies. The known facts of both cases certainly allow for that possibility. Through that lens, the message to prosecutors is that they need to more carefully evaluate the quality of cases they bring.
But if the message is that the people of D.C. are declining to approve charges despite the evidence presented to them, thats something that should worry prosecutors even more.
I am personally voting that both cases are jury nullification and Piro needs to worry if she takes these cases to trial.
Wiz Imp
(6,826 posts)The Grand Jury followed the law. A felony charge was totally unsupportable.
Arazi
(8,332 posts)Its possible the grand jury decided the DOJ was overcharging but it has a definite whiff of jury nullification to me.
I hope some attorneys step up to help him fight this pro bono or its going to get expensive since this DOJ will be determined to make him suffer since hes turned into a bit of a folk hero (like Kilmer Abrego Garcia)
LetMyPeopleVote
(169,179 posts)Link to tweet
3 days ago a DC Grand Jury declined to indict a woman for assaulting an ICE agent (a scratch on his hand).
Today another grand jury declined to indict the guy who threw a sub at an ICE agent!
FREE DC!
