A newsletter by Reuters and Westlaw |
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President Trump has dispatched hundreds of federal agents and National Guard troops to D.C. to combat what he has described as an epidemic of crime and which city leaders have derided as political theater. In the first such analysis, Reuters examined more than 500 criminal cases filed in local court since August 11. Together, the cases offer one of the clearest pictures to date of how the federal government is attempting to tackle crime in the capital. Here’s what to know:
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While the two-week effort has turned up guns and drugs, records from D.C.’s Superior Court show it has also seen federal agents converging in large numbers on low-level crimes like using marijuana or drinking alcohol in public, cases that have seldom been a priority for U.S. law enforcement agencies tasked with targeting drug traffickers and gunrunners.
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The records show that Trump’s anti-crime taskforce was involved in at least 67 local cases over the past two weeks, of which nearly half were for comparatively minor offenses including misdemeanors.
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The rest were for felonies, and about half of those were for carrying a firearm without a license, possessing drugs with intent to distribute, or both. Task force teams seized at least 17 guns last week. None of the cases Reuters reviewed involved someone being charged with a violent offense.
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Instead, the records submitted by police and prosecutors show federal agents assisting police with routine drug busts, searching people seen drinking alcohol in public or behaving suspiciously, and chasing down and arresting people who fled when they were approached by large groups of officers.
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Many of the cases that resulted in gun and drug seizures began with police - sometimes accompanied by agents from as many as six federal law enforcement agencies - stopping people committing minor infractions.
- Read more about what Reuters found here.
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U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta in D.C. will hold a motion hearing in a lawsuit brought by Democracy Forward Foundation seeking to compel the Trump administration to produce documents related to the administration’s agreement with El Salvador that allowed hundreds of people deported from the U.S. to be held in prisons there. Read the complaint.
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Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes. |
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That's how much Delta Air Lines agreed to pay to resolve a class action lawsuit over a 2020 fuel dump that doused tens of thousands of properties, including homes and schools, in Los Angeles and Orange counties in California. Read more. |
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"Given their willingness to settle, you have to imagine the dollar signs are flashing in the eyes of plaintiffs' lawyers around the country."
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— Chris Buccafusco, a professor at Duke University School of Law, commenting on AI company Anthropic’s decision to settle a lawsuit from a group of U.S. authors who alleged copyright infringement. Terms of the deal are expected to become public next week, providing a potential blueprint for other AI companies facing similar cases. Read more about what the deal could mean for AI copyright questions.
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