Witnesses reported that a driver accelerated towards pedestrians at the Washington Monument on Saturday evening. U.S. Park Police reported that the driver has been arrested and charged with attempted assault with a dangerous weapon.
Witnesses called authorities who responded after the driver, who wanted to hurt someone, crashed and ended up on the pedestrian walkway.
The driver reportedly accelerated toward a group of pedestrians in an attempt to hit them, according to NBC Washington.
"My son and I were kind of like, 'What’s going on? That seems weird,’” Nicholas Kline said. “It looked like he was looking for an exit, and then all of a sudden it turned to, no... there is something wrong here.”
First responders arrived on the scene, and the driver was transported to a local hospital with minor injuries, according to U.S. Park Police.
D.C. Fire and EMS said that first responders were dispatched to the Washington Monument at 7:40 p.m. The fire department also confirmed that no pedestrians were injured when the driver drove onto the walkway.
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According to those present, the man was doing figure 8s. At one point, he got out of his SUV and acted as if he was agitated.
"He was going down the walkway, and people were running out of the way. And then he ran right into that wall, literally just missing somebody by I would say a foot," Kline said. "She wasn’t able to jump up. Somebody was dragging her, pulling her up."
The driver was then pulled out of his vehicle by Michael Vachon, who lives nearby. According to Vachon, the driver said, “I’m dying,” when he asked him what his problem was.
The man reportedly responded, saying that “the government is trying to kill me,” to which Vachon told him to lie down. The driver also yelled expletives about Google, Facebook, and Twitter as he was being put in the ambulance.
After he was taken to the ambulance and brought to a hospital, bomb-sniffing dogs were brought to the scene to check the vehicle.