A judge has fully dismissed the criminal case against former Olympian David Hearn on Thursday that alleged Hearn damaged the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, D.C. The ruling comes roughly two months after federal prosecutors dropped the criminal case after concluding that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool was caused by flawed installation rather than vandalism. Judge Todd Edelman referenced that decision in his order dismissing the case.
"Within a month, the government recognized that its prosecution lacked merit," the dismissal said. "It reached this conclusion not because it had misidentified Mr. Hearn as the perpetrator of the alleged act, but because no crime had occurred." Edelman went on to say that "because the government's legitimate interest in maintaining the possibility of a future prosecution seems so marginal, and because of the extraordinary possibility that Mr.
Hearn will nonetheless face a meritless, politically motivated prosecution," the court dismissed the case with prejudice. This means the case has permanently been dismissed and cannot be refiled with the same claims. Newsweek reached out to the White House by email for comment on Thursday morning.
Attempts to reach Hearn, who told Newsweek he had been "targeted" during his arrest in June, were immediately unsuccessful. This is a breaking story.
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