New York City attorneys Colinford Mattis and Urooj Rahman were arrested for tossing a Molotov cocktail into a parked police car in Brooklyn on May 30, 2020, during the riots that swept the country following the death of George Floyd, which had occurred five days earlier.
Reuters reported that Rahman “threw a gasoline-filled bottle” into the police car and “fled in a minivan driven by Mattis.”
Upon their arrest, police officers “found a lighter, a Bud Light beer bottle filled with toilet paper and a gasoline tank” in Mattis’ car, according to WNBC. “Prosecutors allege the lawyers planned to distribute and throw other Molotov cocktails.”
The WNBC piece noted that at the time of their arrests, “While other lawyers condemned their conduct, some objected to the severity of the charges, arguing that the case was improperly being handled as if it were an act of domestic terrorism. When the U.S. attorney in Brooklyn asked that the lawyers be detained without bail, 56 former federal prosecutors sent a legal brief to the court criticizing the government’s handling of the case.”
Perhaps the effectiveness of this action served as the impetus for 51 former U.S. intelligence officials who, several months later, signed an op-ed stating their belief that the Hunter Biden laptop was disinformation, arguably swaying the presidential election.