More complaints were filed against D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department in 2025 than ever before, the News4 I-Team has learned. Weekly complaints increased after federal officers and agents surged into the city in August, often working side by side with D.C. police officers.

The head of a charter school in D.C. filed a complaint after federal immigration authorities and D.C. officers questioned two young men outside her school, in view of students. A comment by one D.C. officer was especially damaging. Months later, the educator and officer met in a mediation session and found some common ground.

As D.C.’s Bilingual Public Charter School in Fort Totten was dismissing students on Sept. 25, a caravan of federal authorities and D.C. police arrived and questioned two men who were not connected to the school.

“I went out there right away. This is my school, and I’m going to protect it, and I’m going to make sure all the kids are safe,” school CEO Daniela Anello told News4.

Cellphone video shows the encounter as the two men in handcuffs sat on a curb.

“If you do not get on the sidewalk, you’ll be arrested for failure to obey a traffic officer,” one D.C. officer warns people gathering.

“Can you tell us what they’re being arrested for?” a woman asks.

“It’s none of your business,” a D.C. officer replies.

It was an incident – among many reported by News4 last year – in which federal immigration authorities took someone into custody alongside D.C. police.

“Do you see who’s watching you? These are children that you’re doing this in front of!” a woman yells.

At one point, a D.C. officer made this comment: “If you have such a problem with us, don’t call 911 next time.”

Anello thought he went too far and his message clashed with what she teaches her students.

“That was very puzzling to me, because we’ve taught our kids over and over: If there’s something harmful, dangerous or scary, you call 911 and the police will come and help you. So that was very upsetting,” she said.

The stop eventually ended when the men were taken into custody.

‘Students cried, asking their parents if they too would be taken away’

The encounter led to several complaints against D.C. police. Concerned about what her students and staff had witnessed, Anello filed a complaint. She also wrote Mayor Muriel Bowser but said she never heard back. News4 reached out to Bowser’s office too.

She did hear from then-Chief of Police Pamela Smith after speaking out at public meetings and testifying before the D.C. Council.

“Students cried, asking their parents if they too would be taken away,” Anello said at a round table.

She filed her complaint with D.C.’s Office of Police Complaints (OPC), an independent agency that investigates complaints against officers in the District. It was one of 1,065 complaints received last year, according to the agency. While complaints are not always found to be misconduct, this is the most complaints the office has received in a year.

“I was complaining about how the police responded in a moment of high stress outside of the school community when kids and staff and community members are watching,” Anello said.

Rebuilding community trust in police

In an interview with the I-Team, OPC Director Marke Cross said he wasn’t surprised 2025 was a record year for complaints.

“We expected there would be a lot more complaints about stops and searches and frisks and things like that,” he said.

Cross said he can’t be sure why there was an increase in complaints; that analysis is ongoing. But he said it points to a level of trust in police that may need to be rebuilt.

“The topic of community trust in the police department in D.C. has a long history,” he said.

News4 asked if 2025 was a particularly hard year for community trust.

“Um, yes. Yes, it has been,” he replied.

A News4 analysis of OPC data shows a 17% increase in weekly complaints after the federal surge began in August. That included allegations on intimidation, property mishandling, and officer language and conduct.

Alicia Yass, who now works for the ACLU, previously served as OPC’s deputy director.

“I think they should be trying to do better. I mean, all of us should always be trying to do better at our jobs. This is not just the police, but the police are being given evidence of what they could be doing better,” she said.

Cross said investigators review and investigate every complaint – reviewing witness statements, body-worn camera video and police reports. After that, only a very small percentage of complaints are upheld. Anello’s was among those.

News4 asked her how much trust-building she thought D.C. police need to do.

“Oh, a lot,” she replied.

School leader describes her mediation session with officer who snapped at crowd

Months after Anello filed her complaint with OPC, she was offered mediation with the officer who snapped at the crowd that day, telling them not to call 911 if they had a problem with police. Their two-hour session was confidential, according to the agency’s rules, but she shared how it felt for her.

“I can say that I received the apology that I was seeking,” she said.

News4 asked, how did that feel?

“Amazing,” she said. “To feel that there was the connection between what I would have wanted to have happened and the police officer’s realization of, ‘Yes, I could have done this better.’ That connected us.”

While OPC can’t take direct disciplinary action against officers, it can make recommendations to D.C. police. There is no automatic mention of the OPC process in an officer’s police personnel file.

But at a time when police and community relations need rebuilding, Anello still believes there’s value in the process and said she hopes her complaint and the hundreds of others this year will change police behavior.

“We had a moment of, ‘You care, I care. We’re both professionals. We’re both trying to keep our communities safe. We’re just going about it in slightly different ways with different roles,’” she said.

OPC’s director said the agency plans to make recommendations to MPD soon based on last year’s complaints, including on the impact of the federal surge.

Interim Chief of Police Jeffery Carroll declined to talk with News4 on camera. We also asked for an interview with the officer who Anello met with; he declined.

An MPD spokesperson said the department hasn’t been briefed about the rise in complaints but plans to provide a more detailed strategy for community outreach in the coming months.

The department said in a statement: “There is nothing more important to MPD than maintaining the trust of DC residents, and we appreciate our community’s partnership and support of our efforts to drive significant reductions in crime over the last two years.

MPD leadership is committed to listening to community concerns, and that’s why our leaders regularly attend Advisory Neighborhood Commission meetings, why MPD has a Citizens Advisory Council, and why we regularly host community walks in all seven police districts. We understand the need to enhance outreach districtwide to ensure we are maintaining trust.”

A Maryland lawmaker is proposing a bill that would authorize the Maryland attorney general and state police to gather identifying digital data about agents who are the subject of misconduct complaints. News4’s Mauricio Casillas reports.

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The man accused of shooting two National Guard members in Washington, D.C., in November pleaded not guilty Wednesday to nine federal charges stemming from the incident. 

Attorneys for 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal pleaded on his behalf in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, according to NewsNation’s Mark Lucivero. Lakanwal is charged with first-degree murder while armed, assault with intent to kill while armed, illegal possession of a firearm and six related charges.

The 29-year-old Lakanwal, who was hospitalized after the incident after he was shot by another Guard member, was present in court Wednesday in a wheelchair and relied on a translator throughout the hearing. 

Twice, Lakanwal’s lawyers and translator had to briefly pause proceedings to explain to him what was happening. 

Lakanwal, an Afghan national, is accused of shooting U.S. Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, both members of the West Virginia National Guard, near Farragut Square Metro Station in the area of 17th and I streets NW. 

Beckstrom died from her injuries the day after the shooting. Wolfe’s mother, Melody Wolfe, wrote on Facebook over the weekend that her son remains in an in-patient rehab facility and is ready to begin an 8 to 12 week residential rehab program.

“Physically, Andy has healed really well and he will be having his cranioplasty (skull reconstruction) in early March,” she added. “It’s a very routine surgery and will allow for even more independence and recovery.”

When U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta asked federal prosecutors Wednesday whether they would pursue additional charges that would allow them to seek the death penalty in the case, they briefly deliberated before telling the judge they are pursuing “death-eligible charges.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi said in November, before Beckstrom died, that the Justice Department will seek the death penalty against Lakanwal.

“If something happens, I will tell you right now, I will tell you early, we will do everything in our power to seek the death penalty against that monster,” Bondi said on Fox News.

Mehta set the next hearing date in the case for May 6.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says history is on his side.

He wants to build a towering arch near the Lincoln Memorial and argues that the nation’s capital first clamored for such a monument two centuries ago — even going so far as to erect four eagle statues as part of the project before being derailed by the attack on Fort Sumter.

“It was interrupted by a thing called the Civil War, and so it never got built,” Trump said aboard Air Force One as he flew to Florida last weekend. “Then, they almost built something in 1902, but it never happened.”

Trump’s history is off — the eagles he references are actually part of a bridge connecting Virginia and Washington that was built decades after the Civil War. The closest Washington came to an arch was a wood and plaster construction built in 1919 to mark the end of World War I — and even that was always meant to be temporary.

“For 200 years they’ve wanted to build an arc,” Trump said, meaning an arch. “They have 57 cities throughout the world that have them. We’re the only major city – Washington, D.C. – that doesn’t.”

Chandra Manning, a history professor at Georgetown University, said Washington was fledgling in the 19th century, dealing with a housing shortage, a lack of boarding houses for visitors, roads that went nowhere and an incomplete U.S. Capitol.

“Washington coming into the Civil War was still this unfinished city,” Manning said. “There’s no push for decorative memorialization in Antebellum Washington because it’s still such a place that doesn’t even have all the functional buildings it needs yet.”

Trump has offered a similar historical rationale for the $400 million ballroom he demolished the White House’s East Wing to begin building — arguing that officials for 150 years have wanted a large event space.

That claim, too, is dubious. While space at the White House has indeed long been an issue, there’s no record of public outcry for a ballroom. Trump nonetheless is employing a similar argument to justify the arch.

“I think it will be the most beautiful in the world,” he said.

‘Biggest one of all’

The arch would stand near the Arlington Memorial Bridge, which spans the Potomac River.

Trump first unveiled the idea at an October dinner for top donors to his ballroom. Without divulging how much the arch would cost, who would pay for it or whether he’d seek approval from planning officials, the president showed off three different-sized arch models, all featuring a statue of Lady Liberty on top.

The president acknowledged then that the largest one was his favorite, and The Washington Post reported that Trump is mulling building an arch standing 250 feet (76 meters) tall. Asked about that aboard Air Force One, Trump didn’t confirm the exact height he desires, but offered: “I’d like it to be the biggest one of all.”

“We’re setting up a committee, and the committee is going to be going over it,” Trump said. “It’ll be substantial.”

The president says he’d like the new structure to be reminiscent of the Arc de Triomphe, at the end of the Champs-Élysées in Paris, which was built to honor those who fought for France during the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars.

But that monument stands only 50 meters (164 feet) high. A 250-foot Washington arch would dwarf the Lincoln Memorial and White House, and even rival the Capitol, which stands 288 feet (88 meters).

The finished arch would be part of a building boom Trump has personally triggered, anxious to use his background as a onetime New York construction mogul to leave a lasting physical mark on the presidency.

In addition to the ballroom, Trump is closing the Kennedy Center for two years of renovations amid backlash from artists over changes he’s made at the nation’s premier performing arts venue. He replaced the lawn in the Rose Garden with a patio area reminiscent of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, and redecorated the Lincoln Bathroom and Palm Room in the White House’s interior.

Trump also installed a Walk of Fame featuring portraits of past presidents along the Colonnade, massive flagpoles on the north and south lawns, and golden flourishes, cherubs and other flashy items to the substantially overhauled Oval Office.

The arch would extend the president’s influence into Washington, where he has talked of beautifying “tired” grassy areas and broken signage and street medians and also deployed the National Guard to help break up homeless encampments.

Harrison Design, a local firm, is working on the project, though no construction start date has been announced. Trump wants to unveil the new structure as part of celebrations marking America’s 250th birthday.

The bridge actually came after the Civil War

Pressed on what Trump meant by the four eagles, the White House sent a photo showing eagle sculptures at the four corners of the Arlington Memorial Bridge, but no further details.

“President Trump is right. The American people for nearly 200 years have wanted an Arch in our Nation’s capital to showcase our great history,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said in a statement. “President Trump’s bold vision will be imprinted upon the fabric of America and be felt by generations to come. His successes will continue to give the greatest Nation on earth — America — the glory it deserves.”

The president’s timing is off, though.

The Arlington Memorial Bridge was first proposed in 1886, but it wasn’t approved by Congress until 1925. According to the National Park Service, the bridge was conceived after the Civil War and meant to memorialize the symbolic reunification of the North and South.

It was originally built to link the site of the Lincoln Memorial with the home of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee — where Arlington National Cemetery now stands. At the time, the direction the eagles would face — right or left, meant to symbolize inward toward the city or outward facing visitors — sparked controversy.

The park service says the bridge was constructed between 1926 and 1931, and an engineer’s report lists only slightly different dates — still decades after Trump’s timeline.

Washington also once had a Victory Arch built near the White House in 1919, to commemorate the end of World War I. It was wood and plaster, however, and meant to be temporary. That structure was torn down in the summer of 1920.

A 2000 proposal called for a peace arch in Washington, but those plans were abandoned after the Sept. 11 attacks the following year.

Manning, who is also a former National Park Service ranger, said that, Washington aside, “I don’t know of a long U.S. tradition of building arches for things.”

“That sounds like an import from elsewhere to me,” she said.

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