DC Man Sues After Detention for Playing Darth Vader Theme

A Washington, DC, resident is suing after a protest in which he followed National Guard troops around and played "The Imperial March" from Star Wars resulted in his detention. Sam O'Hara, 35, filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday, claiming his First and Fourth Amendment rights were violated when he was handcuffed for his musical protest, reports NBC News. O'Hara, represented by the ACLU, says he used his phone and a small speaker to play the song—aka "Darth Vader's Theme"—at a moderate volume while walking a few paces behind National Guard members patrolling city streets.

Per the suit, the incident happened Sept. 11, when an Ohio National Guard member identified by the New York Times as Sgt. Devon Beck confronted O'Hara, warned him the police would be called, and then did just that. When Metropolitan Police officers arrived, they put O'Hara in cuffs, though they said he wasn't being arrested—only that he was allegedly "harassing the National Guard," the suit notes, per NBC. The complaint says O'Hara was detained for about 15 to 20 minutes, per the AP. He was released without charges.

President Trump deployed Guard troops to DC in August in what he says was a bid to curb crime, a move that has sparked controversy and legal challenges. O'Hara's protest videos, posted to TikTok, have since racked up millions of views. The ACLU lawsuit draws on Star Wars language for its argument: "The law might have tolerated government conduct of this sort a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away," it states, "but in the here and now, the First Amendment bars government officials from shutting down peaceful protests."

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"The government doesn't get to decide if your protest is funny, and government officials can't punish you for making them the punch line," an ACLU lawyer repping O'Hara says in a statement, per the Times. O'Hara, meanwhile, calls the whole thing "surreal and dystopian." "When I see armed troops at our farmers markets and outside of my favorite restaurants and my dog park, I don't think, 'Oh, wow, I feel safe,'" he tells the AP. "I think: 'These feel like Stormtroopers. I feel like I'm living in a Star Wars episode or movie, and this is like an invading, dark force." Both DC police and the National Guard declined to comment on the pending lawsuit.