Huffington Post reporter Ryan Reilly has also been charged with trespassing and interfering with a police officer’s performance stemming from a 2014 incident during the Ferguson, Missouri, protests, a spokesperson for the St. Louis County executive confirmed to the outlet.
Reilly and Washington Post reporter Wesley Lowery were arrested in a Ferguson McDonald’s nearly a year ago while covering the unrest after Michael Brown’s death.
Lowery received a court summons naming the charges Monday, and faces a August 24 court date. Reilly has not received the formal summons yet.
In a statement, the Huffington Post condemned the charges and said Reilly had the outlet’s full support:
“Almost a year ago today, Ryan was working on his laptop in a McDonald’s near the protests in Ferguson, Missouri. A crime was committed at the McDonald’s, not by journalists, but by local police who assaulted both Ryan and Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post during violent arrests,” the statement, authored by Washington bureau chief Ryan Grim and senior politics editor Sam Stein, said. “At least we know St. Louis County knows how to file charges. If Wesley Lowery and Ryan J. Reilly can be charged like this with the whole country watching, just imagine what happens when nobody is.”
Reilly previously worked for TPM.
