Maryland man arrested after years of assaulting men he believed were gay in DC park, DOJ says
A Maryland man was arrested Thursday after authorities say he pretended to be a police officer and attacked men he believed to be gay in a Washington, D.C. park — attacks that federal authorities say went on sporadically on for several years.
Michael Thomas Pruden, 48, was arrested in Virginia after a grand jury indictment charged him with five counts of assault on federal land, two counts of impersonating an officer and a hate crimes enhancement alleging Pruden assaulted four of the men because he thought they were gay.
The federal indictment says on five separate occasions between April 30, 2018 and March 26, 2021, Pruden approached and assaulted five men in Meridian Hill Park, known in the city as Malcolm X Park.
Federal authorities say Pruden would go to the park after sunset. On two occasions, he was accused of pretending to be an officer, yelling commands and shining a flashlight at men, according to an indictment filed last month that was unsealed Thursday. He then sprayed the men with a "chemical irritant," the document reads.
Pruden attacked four of the five men because of their "actual or perceived sexual orientation," the indictment says. Federal authorities did not elaborate on the allegations.
In 2020, the most recent year that data is available, the FBI reported receiving nearly 700 reports of hate crimes targeting gay men, the majority of which involved assault or intimidation.
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If convicted, Pruden would face up to 10 years in prison on each assault charge. That maximum sentence could increase if it's determined the assaults were motivated out of hate, the Justice Department said.
It's unclear whether Pruden has legal representation.
Pruden was arrested in a similar incident last year but a federal jury acquitted him. Federal authorities in that case said Pruden impersonated an officer, telling two men, "I'm a cop," before chasing them through a Virginia park area and pepper spraying them, federal charging documents show.
Pruden was arrested after the March 2021 incident. He was acquitted by a jury in August.
The DOJ is asking people who think they may have been victims of similar park attacks to contact the FBI.