FOOTLONG AND FANCY FREE: D.C. Jury Finds Protester Who Lobbed Sandwich at ICE Agent NOT GUILTY

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The man who became a viral meme after flinging a subway sandwich at an ICE agent has been found not guilty by a Washington, D.C. jury.

According to the charging documents, on the evening of August 10, 37-year-old Sean Dunn, a former paralegal at the Department of Justice, was seen yelling obscenities at agents with Customs and Border Patrol, objecting to their presence in the city as part of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

“F*ck you! You f*cking fascists! Why are you here? I don’t want you in my city,” shouted Dunn, before briefly walking away and then returning to throw a sandwich at one of the agents, hitting him in the body armor over his chest. He attempted to run away but was caught and arrested, admitting to police, “I did it. I threw a sandwich.”

A few days later, Attorney General Pam Bondi denounced the incident as “an example of the Deep State we have been up against for seven years as we work to refocus DOJ.”

“Not only is he FIRED, he has been charged with a felony,” Bondi declared.

However, federal prosecutors were unable to secure a felony indictment against Dunn from a grand jury in late August, and then came back and charged him with one federal misdemeanor assault charge for allegedly “assaulting, resisting, opposing, impeding, intimidating and interfering with a federal officer.”

Dunn quickly became an avatar for the protests against Trump’s deployment of ICE agents, especially in D.C., with memes being adapted from a well-known Banksy artwork to depict a man wielding a sub sandwich instead of a bouquet of flowers.

Dunn’s defense attorney Julia Gatto never contested that her client had indeed tossed the sandwich, starting her opening statement with, “He did it. He threw the sandwich.”

Instead, argued Gatto, the legal issue was simple — “bodily injury, that’s the standard” — and the evidence would show that the prosecution “will not come close to convincing you beyond a reasonable doubt the conduct was forcible,” because Dunn’s launch of the sandwich was a “harmless gesture that did not, could not, cause injury.”

Assistant US Attorney John Parron argued that the case was “about the fact that you can’t go around throwing stuff at people when you’re mad,” and urged the jury to focus on that and not whatever opinions they may have about “the federal law enforcement presence in D.C.”

The testimony from Greg Lairmore, the agent who was struck by the sandwich, was likely persuasive for the jury, as he admitted he was not injured and had received gag gifts from his coworkers, including a “felony footlong” patch and a plush toy sandwich. Lairmore chuckled as he testified about these gifts and said he put the toy sandwich “on top of my shelf in the office” and the patch on his lunchbox.

Lairmore had claimed that the sandwich “exploded all over my chest” and “smelled of onions and mustard,” but was challenged about that on cross-examination by Sabrina Shroff, another of Dunn’s defense attorneys. Shroff showed Lairmore a photo of the sandwich, emphasizing how it still wrapped up in the Subway paper, lying on the ground, and asked him if he could tell what kind of sandwich it was and why there were no evidentiary photos of the stains he claimed it left on his uniform.

CBS News legal reporter Jake Rosen watched the trial and reported on the verdict Thursday.

“The sandwich thrower walks free,” wrote Rosen, noting the verdict came after “roughly 7 hours of jury deliberation.”

After the verdict, Dunn spoke to supporters gathered outside the courthouse, thanking them for their support, reported CBS News justice correspondent Scott MacFarlane.

“To the people that opened their hearts to me,” said Dunn, “I’m incredibly grateful.”

“I’m so happy that justice prevails, in spite of everything happening,” he added. “That night, I was protecting the rights of immigrants.”

This is a breaking news story and has been updated.