A suspect seen in a viral video hurling a sub-style sandwich at a federal law enforcement officer Sunday night has been identified as a Department of Justice employee.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said Thursday that Sean Dunn had been fired from the department. Court documents filed Wednesday state that Dunn approached officers, including Metro Transit Police and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, and started yelling.
The incident took place around 11 p.m. on 14th Street NW in Washington, D.C. Dunn allegedly stood within inches of a Customs and Border Protection agent, pointed a finger in his face, and shouted “F*** you! You f****** fascists! Why are you here! I don’t want you in my city!”
This went on for several minutes before he crossed the street and continued to yell. A few minutes later, at about 11.06 p.m., Dunn allegedly approached the CBP agent and threw the sandwich at him, hitting the agent in the chest.
Dunn tried to flee the scene but was detained. As the Metropolitan Police Department processed him, Dunn told an officer, “I did it. I threw a sandwich.”
He has been charged with “assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and employees of the United States.” He faces up to a year in prison if convicted.
The U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, former Fox News host Jeanine Pirro, said in a video on X on Wednesday that Dunn would be charged with a felony.
Dunn worked as an international affairs specialist in the Office of International Affairs in the criminal division of the Department of Justice, an official told Bloomberg Law. The office handles prisoner swaps, international extraditions, and other overseas actions. The 37-year-old lives in D.C., a spokesperson for the office of the D.C. U.S. attorney told The Washington Post.
A source at the department told Axios that Dunn was hired in 2022 as a specialist who was still “burrowed in” from the Biden administration.
The Independent has contacted Dunn’s attorney and the Department of Justice for comment.
“If you touch any law enforcement officer, we will come after you,” Bondi said on X, adding that Dunn was “no longer” a Department of Justice employee. “Not only is he FIRED, he has been charged with a felony.”
“This is an example of the Deep State we have been up against for seven months as we work to refocus DOJ,” she added. “You will NOT work in this administration while disrespecting our government and law enforcement.”
In a video posted on X, Pirro said Dunn “thought it was funny.”
“Well, he doesn’t think it’s funny today, because we charged him with a felony assault on a police officer, and we’re gonna back the police to the hilt, so there!” she added. “Stick your Subway sandwich somewhere else.”
The footage of the incident, which took place in a popular nightlife area of D.C., quickly went viral after being shared on Instagram under the account @bigap4l.
Cortez Dargin filmed the video, telling The Post that he was leaving a nightclub with his friends when they heard Dunn yelling.
“I was like, ‘Let me record this guy, because he’s going crazy right now,’” he told the paper.
In the footage, Dunn can be seen chanting “shame” before turning away from the officers and walking away, returning a short time later to where the officers were before he hurled the sandwich at them.
The incident took place as President Donald Trump flooded the nation’s capital with federal law enforcement agents and National Guard troops. While Trump claims that Washington is a city plagued by crime, city officials note that statistics show that violent crime is at its lowest point in three decades.
On Monday, Trump announced that he was placing the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department under federal control and deploying the National Guard to “rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor, and worse.”
National Guard troops began patrolling the streets of Washington Tuesday night, with a total of about 800 troops being deployed.
