The US Attorney for Washington, DC is refusing to prosecute nearly 70 people District police arrested for rioting during the August unrest in the city, claiming that police charged the individuals with insufficient evidence, the Washington Post reports.
D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser publicly criticized the US Attorney’s office for failing to proceed with prosecutions in these cases, saying acting U.S. attorney Michael Sherwin’s office has declined to follow through on 28 search warrants and arrest warrants application DC Metro police submitted. Sherwin’s office, Bowser said, has also failed to process at least 24 others.
Sherwin opted to shift the blame to police, saying that in one specific case of 42 people arrested for vandalism of federal buildings and setting fire to patio umbrellas in Northwest Washington’s Adams Morgan neighborhood.
“The ‘42 rioters’ were arrested as a collective by MPD and presented to the Office without any articulable facts linking criminal conduct to each individual arrested,” Sherwin said in a personal letter to Bowser’s office.
Sherwin’s letter, however, did not address the 70 arrests and the 52 warrants requested by DC Metro Police.