Jury acquits man on all counts in attacks targeting gay men in Meridian Hill Park

WASHINGTON — A federal grand jury acquitted a Virginia man on all counts against him Friday in connection to a series of attacks targeting gay men in D.C.’s Meridian Hill Park in 2021.

Jurors deliberated across two days before returning a not guilty verdict on all six counts against Michael Thomas Pruden, 50, of Norfolk. A seventh count was dismissed by the government last week prior to the beginning of trial.

Pruden was indicted in July 2022 on multiple counts of assault and impersonating a federal officer, along with a hate crimes enhancement. At the time, federal investigators claimed between April 2018 and March 2021 Pruden had attacked at least five different men with pepper spray in Meridian Hill Park, also known as Malcom X Park, near 16th and U Streets in D.C. Prosecutors said the park is informally known as a “cruising” spot for gay men and alleged the crimes were motivated by anti-gay bias.

According to the indictment, the suspect in that case had approached victims with a flashlight, given “police-style commands” and then sprayed them with a chemical irritant.

Friday’s verdict marks the second time Pruden, a former Maryland elementary school teacher, has been acquitted of assaults in the D.C. area. In 2021, Pruden was charged in connection with an alleged assault at Daingerfeld Island in Alexandria. An indictment returned by a federal grand jury in that case accused Pruden of one count of assault with the intent to do bodily harm for allegedly attacking another person with pepper spray and a tree branch. A jury in the Eastern District of Virginia acquitted Pruden on that count in August of that same year.

Pruden was represented by assistant federal public defenders Alexis Morgan Gardner and Courtney Millian from the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the District of Columbia.