A former Prince George’s Area, Maryland, grade school educator that was detained on assault charges in Virginia and prosecuted for …
A previous Prince George’s County, Maryland, elementary school educator that was apprehended on attack charges in Virginia and arraigned for presumably striking individuals with pepper spray in a D.C. park was found not guilty.
Years after Michael Thomas Pruden, 50, was hit with seven government attack fees related to “bias-motivated attacks” on guys from 2018 to 2021 in Meridian Hill/Malcolm X Park, a jury of his peers in Washington D.C. acquitted him of all fees.
Initially, district attorneys suggested before a grand court that Pruden struck victims as a result of their perceived sexual orientation, targeting a park known for cruising, or “a gathering place for males looking for consensual sex with other men,” according to charging records.
The charge identified a total of five victims that were attacked during evening tasks at the park in D.C., declaring Pruden acted to be a member of law enforcement and attacked unsuspecting males.
“Prior to spraying the men, Pruden made believe to be a Park Police officer, shined a flashlight in the sufferers’ faces and provided the victims police-style instructions,” the division claimed in a July 2022 press release.
Prosecutors also came up with electronic evidence from Pruden– “text or social networks messages or profiles that reference ‘cruising,’ Meridian Hillside Park or Malcolm X Park,” and social networks activity on systems like Jack ‘d and Grindr ahead of this week’s jury trial. Jurors started consideration Thursday and reached their decision Friday afternoon.
Pruden’s pardon comes greater than 2 years after his arrest in Norfolk, Virginia, due partly to substantial hold-ups in the trial. Noteworthy problems included adjustments in depiction and activities to bifurcate the test– dividing the inquiry of whether Pruden dedicated the offenses charged from consideration on the factor being the sufferers’ upheld or assumed sexual preference.
The court’s decision likewise adhered to costs for assaults on two people at Daingerfield Island in Alexandria, Virginia, in 2021. The Alexandria instance likewise ended with Pruden being found not guilty judgment in both incidents.
