22-year-old Brandon Lord Figures-Mormon was driving a Pickup Truck at speed through the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington DC shortly before 9 p.m. on Thursday evening. He then purposely hit two DC bicycle patrol officers and a District Department of Transportation (DDOT) traffic control aide.

Pickup truck crashes into truck after hitting officers

After the truck struck the officers, the vehicle proceeded through the intersection and ended up crashing into an unoccupied truck. According to Peter Newsham of the Washington DC police, both the driver and a passenger in the speeding vehicle were placed under arrest.

The driver reportedly was in possession of an unregistered assault rifle that was recovered from the truck.

One Dc Police officer is still in a critical condition in hospital but is stable, while the other two have serious, but non-life-threatening injuries. There are no indications of any other injuries from the incident, other than the officers and the two suspects who both received non-life-threatening injuries in the subsequent accident. The DDOT officer was treated and released from hospital.

So far there is no known motive for the incident

When asked at the news briefing if he believed the incident to be related to terrorism, Newsham said they have to look closely at that, as so far they have no clear motive for the incident.

So far the Metropolitan Police Department is taking the lead in the investigation and the FBI is not involved, which the New York Times reports probably signifies that authorities are not taking terrorism as a motive for the incident.

As reported on the Metropolitan Police Department website, the driver, Figures-Mormon of Disputanta, VA, was charged with Assault with Intent to Kill along with Possession of an Unregistered Firearm, while his passenger, Dwayne Nicholas Taylor of Prince George, VA, is facing charges of the Possession of an Unregistered Firearm.

Diners at restaurants watched the incident as it unfolded

According to the Times report, the incident happened in an area where many people were dining outside restaurants. One witness to the accident, Ari Rabin-Havt, said they could hear the screeching of tires and some screaming, just before a white pickup truck zoomed past at a high rate of speed.

He added that the pickup truck slammed into a large city truck, which he said looked like a garbage truck.

As noted by the Times, fears of possible terrorism arose due to recent incidents involving vehicles. In London last week, three terrorists in a van drove through pedestrians on the London Bridge at the start of their brutal London attack. Prior to that incident, a terrorist in March drove into pedestrians in Westminster, London before stabbing a police officer to death. Last year a man plowed a truck through a crowd of pedestrians in Nice, France, with more than 80 people killed.
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