U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro's office on Thursday charged a man accused of throwing a sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent in Washington, D.C., this month with misdemeanor assault, issuing the charge one day after it failed to persuade a grand jury to return a felony indictment.
Sean Dunn, who Attorney General Pam Bondi confirmed was a Justice Department employee at the time of the incident, was seen in a now-viral video throwing a salami sub at the immigration agent days after President Donald Trump directed an increased federal law enforcement presence in D.C. Trump framed the move as an effort to address crime in the city, despite data suggesting criminal activity was already trending downward.
Prosecutors alleged in a criminal complaint that Dunn, 37, confronted federal agents stationed outside a popular nightlife area.
“F--- you! You f---ing fascists! Why are you here? I don’t want you in my city!” Dunn yelled at officers before he threw a sandwich that struck a Customs and Border Protection agent in the chest, prosecutors said.
Dunn tried to run away but was arrested by officers on the scene, the complaint indicated.
The incident took place Aug. 10 in the heart of D.C.'s U Street Corridor, a neighborhood that played a historic role in the civil rights era and is now a nightlife hot spot.
A Justice Department employee told NBC News that Dunn at the time worked in the international affairs section of the criminal division at the Justice Department.
After the incident, Bondi said Dunn was promptly fired from the department, later writing in a statement, "you will NOT work in this administration while disrespecting our government and law enforcement."
Some D.C. residents heralded Dunn, raising video of the incident as a symbol of resistance to Trump and his deployment of thousands of federal law enforcement personnel to the city. Banksy-inspired illustrations of a man throwing a sub have begun to pop up on walls throughout D.C., Washingtonian magazine reported.
Federal prosecutors initially sought to charge Dunn with felony assault, which requires a grand jury indictment from a panel of Washington residents. But a jury on Wednesday declined to return an indictment, an implicit suggestion that residents did not identify sufficient probable cause to back the charge.
The decision is not the first time a D.C. grand jury has opted against signing off on charges, with prosecutors repeatedly having failed to secure a felony indictment against a woman who was arrested on suspicion of assaulting FBI agents during an immigration-related protest last month, The New York Times reported.
The jury's decision also signaled mounting backlash among D.C. residents to Trump's surge of federal law enforcement personnel, which critics have panned as unnecessary, a scare tactic and racially motivated.
