Two Lawyers Caught Passing Out Molotovs At George Floyd Protest, Throws One At Police Car

Two Brooklyn lawyers who firebombed an empty New York City Police Department (NYPD) van on May 29 during George Floyd protests in the city were each released on $250,000 bail Monday.

Colinford Mattis, 32, and Urooj Rahman, 31, were arrested in their tan minivan Friday evening after being chased by officers of the 88th Precinct station house in Fort Greene. Rahman was spotted by cops as she threw a Budweiser petrol bomb into the cop car before climbing back into the minivan and speeding away. Video surveillance outside the 88th Precinct showed Rahman throwing the lighted Molotov cocktail inside the police car.

Officers pursued the duo for a couple of blocks before stopping their minivan. The cops also said they saw supplies to make additional Molotov cocktails in plain view inside the van.

Federal prosecutors for the Eastern District of New York alleged Mattis and Rahman were handing out Molotov cocktails to demonstrators. They claimed a bystander took a photo of the pair in their van while they were trying to give the Molotov cocktails to protestors in the city. It's unclear how Rahman and Mattis knew each other.

Federal judge Steven Gold in Brooklyn agreed Monday to release Mattis and Rahman, each on $250,000 bonds. Both Mattis and Rahman were also released on home detention pending trial.

“What the government alleges is, in effect, a property offense. There was no one inside (the police van),” said one of Rahman’s defense lawyers before Gold's decision.

He also said Rahman, who lives in south Brooklyn and takes care of her sick mother, has represented impoverished Bronx tenants as a public interest and human rights lawyer. Rahman is also exceptionally well-educated.

Mattis was furloughed recently as an associate from Pryor Cashman LLP, a New York City law firm involved in corporate, intellectual property, real estate, bankruptcy, and tax cases, among others. He lives in East New York, Brooklyn with his sister. Mattis received his Juris Doctor degree from New York University.

He graduated from Princeton University and was a former president of the African American Students Union. Mattis was also an anti-poverty intern for the mayor of San Francisco, a middle school math and science teacher with Teach for America and an intellectual property intern at Microsoft.