Judge asks why jail placed suspect in White House correspondents dinner attack on suicide watch

Source: Associated Press



This courtroom sketch depicts Cole Tomas Allen, center, listening as his attorney Eugene Ohm, left, speaks to U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui, Monday, May 4, 2026, in Washington, as Tony Towns, the acting general counsel for the District of Columbia Department of Corrections, listens at right.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal magistrate judge on Monday pressed a jail official to explain why a man charged with trying to storm the White House Correspondents' Association dinner and attempting to kill President Donald Trump was placed on restrictive suicide watch after his arrest.

Officials at the city jail in Washington, D.C., removed Cole Tomas Allen from its designated "suicide status" over the weekend after his attorneys complained that he had been unnecessarily confined in a padded room with constant lighting, repeatedly strip searched and placed in restraints outside his cell.

But the relaxed conditions didn't satisfy U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui's concerns that Allen may have received disparate, punitive treatment in violation of his due process rights. Faruqui noted that the D.C. jail routinely houses convicted killers and others charged with violent crimes without placing them on 24-hour lockdown.

"It could drive a person crazy to be in that situation," he said.

Allen's lawyers said he wasn't showing any suicidal risk factors after his arrest. But a jail psychiatrist evaluated him and initially concluded that he posed a suicide risk, according to Tony Towns, acting general counsel for the city's corrections department.

Read more: https://tribtown.com/2026/05/04/judge-asks-why-jail-placed-suspect-in-white-house-correspondents-dinner-attack-on-suicide-watch/