The Trump administration has dropped its case against a former Olympic canoeist charged in connection with damage to the Reflecting Pool, acknowledging their allegations against David “Davey” Hearn don’t hold water.
In a filing Friday afternoon, a supervisor in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, which is headed by Jeanine Pirro, wrote that officials obtained information that undermined “the evidentiary basis for the indictment” against Hearn.
Prosecutors said that after the indictment came down on July 2, the Interior Department provided additional documents to the U.S. Attorney’s Office “indicating that damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in June 2026 was the result of flawed installation by the contractor, Atlantic Industrial Coatings.”
DOJ said it “first became aware of information showing that the damage was the result of a botched installation and not vandalism” after reviewing more documents.
“Had [the Interior Department] been forthcoming with the information clearly in its possession, the government would not have sought a grand jury indictment,” the filing said.
DOJ said when it presented the case to a grand jury, it was “not in possession of any information from DOI indicating that any damage to the Reflecting Pool was caused by anything other than the actions of the defendant and other vandals who damaged the pool’s lining.”
The Justice Department filing said that based on its review of evidence, “it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism, let alone to establish that fact beyond a reasonable doubt.”
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Don't drink the water?Hackers have targeted water systems in several US states in a coordinated cyberattack that has caused some utilities to issue boil-water notices and switch to manual mode, taking their systems offline, according to US officials.
It’s one of the most serious cyberattacks on water systems in the US in years, according to some analysts. The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the FBI and the Environmental Protection Agency have for the last week been scrambling to try to help secure the water facilities and ensure that the safety of drinking water isn’t affected. No incidents of contamination have been reported.
The hackers “are targeting water entities of all sizes,” CISA said in a warning Thursday that urged water facilities to get vulnerable industrial equipment offline.
US and state officials are treating Iran as one of the suspects behind the hack, but have not made a formal determination of who is responsible and are wary of false flags.
https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/31/politics/sweeping-cyberattack-us-water-systems
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Word association thread -
Meta-thread: Word association threadFor a while now, I have felt we might benefit from a meta-thread about the Word association thread
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Word association thread
