Acting US Attorney Michael Sherwin announced that a Baltimore woman has been charged with felony assault on a police officer while armed and misdemeanor rioting, alleging that she threw a firework at officers, burning the pants of one, during last month’s racial justice protests.
The protester identified as 26-year-old Alanna Rogers was arraigned on September 10 in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.
According to a statement by Sherwin’s office, Rogers was initially arrested on Sunday, August 31, after the incident took place near Black Lives Matter Plaza during a demonstration, but she was not charged at that time.
The charges came later as a result of an additional investigation by the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) and the US Attorney’s Office for DC.
Judge Sean Staples of the DC Superior Court found probable cause for the charges, however, released Rogers, after finding that the presumption was rebutted by her lack of criminal history. She was ordered to stay away from the 800 and 900 blocks of Sixteenth Street, Northwest, and not to possess fireworks.
Rogers is the third person who has been charged with protest-related crimes in the District over the past few weeks. The US Attorney’s Office filed similar charges against two other individuals last week.
The two defendants were DC residents Mankah Wu and Michael Powell, who were respectively charged with “misdemeanor rioting” for preventing officers from entering the blocks occupied by protesters near Black Lives Matter Plaza on the night of August 30 by using his bicycle, and “misdemeanor destruction of property, defacing property, and misdemeanor rioting” for his conduct at a Black Lives Matter protest in Adams Morgan on August 14, when 42 protesters were arrested.