Eight men have been indicted in an alleged plot to attack a UFC event on the grounds of The White House last month, widening a case that prosecutors say was built around drones, snipers and a plan to strike people running from the South Lawn. The new two-count indictment was returned Thursday in Columbus, Ohio, and adds an eighth defendant, Chandler D. Scaggs, to a case that had already produced seven arrests.
The timing matters because the alleged target was not a vague future gathering. It was the June 14 event at the South Lawn of the White House, and the case now turns on what prosecutors say the men were preparing to do there. Authorities arrested five men the weekend the event took place and two more the following week, before the grand jury replaced the earlier criminal complaints with a single indictment covering all eight defendants.
Scaggs, 21, of Chapmanville, West Virginia, was allegedly assigned to be one of the snipers. Prosecutors say he was supposed to be picked up by Tycen Proper, 19, of Danville, Ohio, and travel with him to Washington, D.C. But after Scaggs and other alleged members of the plot lost contact with Proper following his arrest by federal authorities, Scaggs allegedly made new travel plans and said he still wanted to carry out the attack. He was later taken into custody in West Virginia.
That detail gives the indictment its sharpest edge. The case is not built only on a single arrest or a single conversation, but on what prosecutors describe as a structured system of action, including a tier system to classify participants in the conspiracy. Tier one participants, they said, were expected to put themselves in harm’s way, break the law and potentially go into hiding. The alleged target list was broad as well, reaching to high-value names including President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Elon Musk and the Prime Minster of Israel.
The indictment charges all eight men with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and conspiracy to commit murder on federal government territory and to murder a federal government official. If convicted, each could face up to life in prison. Tycen Proper’s attorney said he will enter a plea of not guilty and asked the public to remember that he is 19 years old, the youngest of anyone charged in the case. That leaves the central question where prosecutors want it: not whether the case is serious, but how much of the alleged plan they can prove in court after turning separate complaints from several districts into one indictment.
