The suspected wannabe assassin who opened fire at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner last weekend is “not a danger to anybody,” his lawyer argued in court on Wednesday.
In a court filing, Cole Allen’s defense team argued that the gunman should be allowed to roam free as he awaits his trial, the New York Post reported. Allen’s lawyer also claimed that the suspect had no intention of carrying out a mass shooting since he was not carrying an automatic or semi-automatic weapon.
“Mr. Allen has no criminal history — not even prior arrests, which alone would rebut the presumption of detention,” his defense team wrote, adding, “The government’s rhetoric about a ‘mass shooting’ is also unsupported by its own proffered facts. Mr. Allen was not alleged to be holding an automatic or even semi-automatic weapon that are the hallmarks of the modern-day mass shooting.”
During a court hearing on Thursday, defense attorney Tezira Abe said Allen’s defense team was changing course and dropping its request to keep him out of detention “at this time.” Abe then asked the judge for Allen to be removed from his “safe cell,” where he’s remained isolated around the clock since being taken into custody. Allen, wearing an orange jump suit, was present for the hearing in the D.C. federal court on Thursday.
Allen ran through a security checkpoint inside the Washington Hilton last Saturday and fired one shot from his Mossberg 12-gauge pump-action shotgun before he fell to the ground and was detained by Secret Service and law enforcement agents, according to federal prosecutors. The gunman was also carrying a fully-loaded Rock Island Armory 1911 .38 caliber pistol and multiple knives.
Shotguns have been used in some of the darkest mass shootings in U.S. history, including by the gunmen at Columbine, the Aurora theater, and Washington Navy Yard.
In a manifesto that Allen sent to family members just before the attack, the gunman said he was targeting top Trump administration officials at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner and added that he would shoot any of the attendees or law enforcement officers who got in his way.
“I would still go through most everyone here to get to the targets if it were absolutely necessary (on the basis that most people *chose* to attend a speech by a pedophile, rapist, and traitor, and are thus complicit) but I really hope it doesn’t come to that,” he wrote in the manifesto.
Three law enforcement sources told NBC News on Wednesday that Allen fired the shot that struck a Secret Service agent after early reports suggested the agent might have been hit by friendly fire. The agent was protected by his bulletproof vest.
A Secret Service agent fired five times at Allen as he charged through the security checkpoint, but Allen was not hit, according to federal prosecutors. The gunman fell down and suffered a minor knee injury immediately after he breached the security checkpoint, the Justice Department stated.
Allen is charged with attempting to assassinate the president of the United States, transportation of a firearm and ammunition in interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony, and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence.
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