Lawyers for suspected gunman at press dinner agree to keeping him in jail before trial
By Holmes Lybrand, CNN
(CNN) — Lawyers for Cole Tomas Allen — the 31-year-old California man accused of attempting to kill President Donald Trump at Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner — agree that their client should remain in jail ahead of trial.
The hearing began just after 11 a.m. ET and Allen appeared in orange prison scrubs.
“We had difficulties meeting with Allen over the past couple of days,” one of Allen’s lawyers said, noting they have finally met with him. “We are conceding detention.”
Lawyers for Allen previously filed a memo indicating they would dispute his detention. Despite Allen’s team agreeing to detention Thursday, prosecutors still asked a judge to present their case on why he should be held.
“I’m denying the government’s request,” the judge said. “It’s truly unprecedented.”
Prosecutors filed a detention memo Wednesday saying there are “no combination of conditions that will reasonably assure the community’s safety” if Allen were to be released, pointing to his extensive preparations ahead of the dinner as well as the possibility that he could have killed people and inflicted serious damage.
They called his plot one of “extreme political violence.”
“Attempted murder is always a serious crime, but when the intended victim is the President of the United States, as well as other high-ranking members of the U.S. government, the potential consequences are far reaching,” the memo said.
Lawyers for Allen, however, had previously pushed back — opposing detention in their own memo to the judge. The lawyers questioned whether prosecutors have direct evidence of their claims, particularly the allegation that Allen fired his shotgun in the direction of a Secret Service officer on Saturday evening.
“The government’s evidence of the charged offense – the attempted assassination of the president – is thus built entirely upon speculation,” they wrote in a filing arguing for his release ahead of trial.
Prosecutors could point to a note Allen reportedly sent to family members outlining how he wanted to target administration officials, his social media posts and any other material that points to his potential motivation.
Another key issue in the early days of the case has been whether Allen fired his shotgun and hit the Secret Service officer who fired at the man several times and missed.
Defense attorneys have questioned whether prosecutors know if Allen fired his weapon and whether he struck the Secret Service officer.
DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro, whose office is leading the prosecution of Allen, told Fox News on Thursday morning that Allen “fired that gun in the direction of the Secret Service officer.”
Pirro noted the officer fired five times and investigators have “found five areas consistent with being hit by a nine millimeter,” which is the service weapon officers are equipped with.
“So this Secret Service agent did not shoot himself,” Pirro concluded.
According to prosecutors, Allen traveled by train from California to Washington, DC, in the days prior to Saturday night’s event and stayed at the same hotel the dinner took place.
He was arrested before he made it into the dinner, which was on a different floor.
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