A dramatic security incident unfolded outside the White House on Saturday afternoon when a man drove onto the sidewalk and demanded to speak with President Donald Trump, prompting an immediate Secret Service response.

Law enforcement and military personnel rushed to the area near Lafayette Square after the vehicle mounted the sidewalk at 16th and H streets Northwest shortly after 12:15 p.m.

Officers detained the unidentified driver, photographed him in handcuffs and surrounded the vehicle while conducting a search.

The man reportedly insisted on speaking directly with Trump. However, the president was not at the White House when the incident occurred.

According to his public schedule, Trump was spending Saturday at Camp David in Maryland.

The incident triggered an extensive security operation along the northern edge of the White House complex. Secret Service vehicles raced to the scene, while authorities temporarily shut down nearby roads.

‘Out of an abundance of caution, local roads were shut down, and the vehicle was swept with negative results,’ a Secret Service spokesperson said.

The agency said the search found no dangerous materials inside the vehicle.

The man was later taken to a nearby hospital for a ‘mental health evaluation,’ the Secret Service said.

Authorities have not released the man’s identity. They also have not said what led him to drive onto the sidewalk or why he allegedly wanted to meet Trump.

Images from the scene showed a large law-enforcement presence, with officers inspecting the vehicle and restricting access to part of the surrounding area.

The intersection is directly beside Lafayette Square and falls within the tightly secured zone surrounding the White House.

The National Park Service says the White House area includes parkland and nearby sidewalks extending north to H Street and west to 17th Street.

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The Secret Service credited its officers with quickly securing the area.

‘We appreciate the swift actions of our Secret Service Police Officers and are grateful to the Metropolitan Police Department for their prompt response,’ the agency spokesperson said.

Saturday’s episode follows a series of security incidents near one of the most heavily protected buildings in the United States.

The investigation into exactly what led to the incident remains ongoing.

Authorities have not announced criminal charges against the man or publicly detailed what he allegedly said while demanding to speak with the president.

Just months earlier, on May 23, gunfire erupted near the intersection of Pennsylvania Avenue and 17th Street Northwest, close to the White House complex.

Two people were struck in that incident before the alleged shooter, later identified as 21-year-old Nasire Best, approached the White House complex and pulled a firearm from a bag, according to previous reports.

Best allegedly fired several shots before Secret Service personnel opened fire, killing him.

That shooting was itself preceded by another vehicle-related scare in March, when a van crashed through a barricade near Connecticut Avenue and H Street at approximately 6:30am.

The Secret Service said at the time that the driver was detained and questioned.

A classic AFL contest ended in ugly scenes at the MCG when Hawthorn supporters threw bottles towards the umpires after a disputed late decision in the Hawks’ preliminary-final clash with the Brisbane Lions.

Hawthorn’s season ended in preliminary-final heartbreak for the second year in succession, with Brisbane holding on for a 20.11 (131) to 19.8 (122) victory.

The decisive moment came with just 18 seconds remaining. Defender Jarman Impey was penalised for holding the ball, allowing Brisbane’s Hugh McCluggage to take a free kick and slot the goal that ultimately sealed the Lions’ place in the grand final.

A Fox Sports commentator described the ruling as “the biggest call you have ever seen”.

The decision prompted a huge backlash from the Hawthorn faithful, with loud boos echoing around the MCG before several bottles were thrown towards the umpires as they made their way from the field.

In one alarming moment, an official warned a colleague about an object flying towards them. The umpire ducked to avoid the bottle before pointing towards the suspected spectator so security could intervene.

“We’ve never seen bottles thrown on the ground like this before, have we? Have we ever seen a scene like this?” SEN broadcaster Dwane Russell asked.

Hawthorn premiership champion Luke Hodge also voiced his disapproval of the supporters’ behaviour.

“The umpires are walking off, they should not have things thrown at them. A bottle has come down from the top tier,” Hodge said.

The incident was widely condemned online, with one football fan posting: “Disgraceful. Should be life bans dished out.”

Another supporter wrote: “That’s not the way, boys. Not our night, but shouldn’t be doing that.”

A third added: “Embarrassing behaviour — no, disgraceful. The AFL needs to come down hard on this type of behaviour.”

Hawthorn captain James Sicily, Tom Barrass and Jack Ginnivan were also seen confronting the umpires in an animated exchange after the final siren.

Ruckman Lloyd Meek was visibly emotional and swore while speaking to reporters in the rooms. Coach Sam Mitchell, however, maintained his composure during a difficult post-match press conference, describing the loss as a moment of mourning.

“This feeling is the pits,” Mitchell said.

Mitchell said he was unaware of Sicily, Barrass and Ginnivan approaching the umpires, although he knew bottles had been thrown onto the field.

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“At the end of the game, part of me wanted to break down in tears, part of me wanted to scream with rage, part of me wanted to throw chairs — you don’t know how to react,” he said.

‘So when you’re in the stand, you need to continue to be feeling that emotion, because that’s why we love it, but how it manifests itself – we shouldn’t be throwing things on the field and doing those types of things.

‘But the passion in the stand and the passion of the game is why we love it so much. So I hope that for the vast majority it was felt responsibly.’

Meek was near Impey when the free was paid.

‘It’s heartbreaking… We pour our heart and soul into this. I was standing right next to him – I will be replaying that one for a while,’ Meek said.

‘I just feel like I probably could have jumped on and knocked the ball out or done a “stacks-on” – something … it’s hard, in the dying moments.’

Mitchell spoke of grief and added it was too soon to think beyond what had just happened.

‘I think we’re in a mourning phase. What’s the first part, is it anger? I think I’m still half in anger, probably sense it in my body language,’ he said.

‘What else, what’s after anger? I don’t know, last is acceptance and – I nearly said a bad word – I’m a long way from acceptance right now.

‘I will sit in anger for a bit longer, I’m sure all the players will too.’

Before they left the MCG for the last time this season, Mitchell brought his players into a tight group.

‘It was just, “Remember this”. There’s nothing more raw than that five minutes straight after the siren, when it hurts the most,’ Meek said of Mitchell’s message.

‘Remember the burn and the outrage and how frustrating it is – because that will be our fuel. We have a big pre-season ahead.’

Mitchell spoke of his great pride in the Hawks, who staged an outstanding comeback in the final quarter.

But in the end, it came to nothing.

‘If you want to strive for great things, you will open yourself up for all sorts of emotion, the greatest of joy, and the deepest of pain,’ he said.

The bakery at Dublin’s Mountjoy Prison has been shut down amid concerns that gangland figures were using it as a route for delivering drugs.

The disclosure appears in internal Irish Prison Service (IPS) documents obtained by the Irish Mail on Sunday under the Freedom of Information Act.

Mountjoy’s bakery had previously been held up as a model for prisons in other jurisdictions, including Hydebank Wood prison for women and young offenders in Belfast.

However, the FOI records describe the bakery, which supplies bread to prisons across Dublin, as a known ‘channel for contraband’.

The description was included in an October 2024 email from Mary Leydon, a governor in the IPS Human Resources Directorate.

Her email was sent while IPS management and staff were negotiating the bakery’s closure.

Alongside identifying the facility as a source of contraband, Ms Leydon said it had been linked to ‘H&S [health and safety] concerns over the years’, adding that management had raised ‘serious concerns’.

‘This was a challenging negotiation process but we believe after years attempting it, we have finally achieved its closure,’ Ms Leydon wrote.

She said the shutdown would take place ‘on phased basis over 12-18 months’, allowing other prisons time to secure an alternative supplier.

The decision to close the bakery was first disclosed publicly in the Dáil a year later, in November 2025, by Justice Minister Jim O’Callaghan.

Mr O’Callaghan did not mention specific contraband concerns, but referred generally to the ‘enhanced security’ that would result from the closure.

Replying to a parliamentary question from Sinn Féin TD Matt Carthy, Mr O’Callaghan said supplying bread to Dublin’s prisons through Mountjoy’s bakery cost €660,000 a year—€110,000 more than using a commercial provider.

He said the bakery would instead become ‘a training facility to deliver certified training in baking skills to people in custody.’

Several high-profile prisoners have worked in the Mountjoy bakery over the years, including convicted boom-time thief Michael Lynn and Mr Moonlight murderer Patrick Quirke. There is no suggestion that either man was involved in moving contraband through the facility.

Prison sources said the bakery was regarded as a highly sought-after job among inmates. Located on the same footprint as the kitchen, just off E Division, its goods gate is about 30 to 40 metres from Mountjoy’s main entrance.

‘The bakery in Mountjoy would have been something that was highly successful back in the day,’ one officer told the MoS.

‘It produced a lot of good bread and a lot of work for prisoners as well. It gave them something useful to be doing.’

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But the bakery was also known as a weak link that gangs were able to manipulate to get drugs and phones into Mountjoy.

‘All the stuff coming in from suppliers is not always checked by dog units and search teams,’ another officer told the MoS.

He added that the loading bay doors for food deliveries to the bakery and kitchen were not always appropriately locked.

‘If you’re bringing in something – especially a substance such as white flour – it can become very easy to bring in something extra, and that was always the problem with it,’ they said.

‘Everybody knew the stuff was coming in via deliveries. Prisoners had been caught removing drugs from the underside of delivery trucks and so on.’

The sources told how service lifts in the loading bay and food preparation areas can be used to distribute drugs further into the depths of the prison once they are delivered to the bakery.

The scale of this smuggling can be judged by a successful, intelligence-led operation implemented by the IPS in 2020.

In November that year, the largest haul of contraband ever intercepted was found hidden in bags of sugar and sprinkled with coffee to confuse sniffer dogs.

The consignment, hidden as part of a food truck delivery, included drugs, alcohol, phones and SIM cards.

In all 10,000 tablets, bags of cocaine, cannabis, 30 phones, SIM cards, bottles of whiskey, steroids and an exercise band were discovered.

So successful was this smuggling route, that gangs were able to supply contraband to order to individual prisoners.

This is evident by the manner in which drugs packages were individually wrapped with prisoners’ names on them.

According to gardaí at the time’ the cocaine had an estimated value of €140,000, the tablets were valued at €20,000, and the cannabis was worth €5,000.

Speaking at the time of the seizure, IPS Director General, Caron McCaffrey, said: ‘There were 600 boxes, with each being painstakingly taken off the truck and searched, and it was in the middle of the last pallet of items, that it was detected, in two boxes which purported to be sugar but when those boxes are opened, they contained a very significant amount of contraband.’

Ms McCaffrey said the drugs could have resulted in deaths among the prisoner population had they made their way into Mountjoy.

‘They certainly result in inter-prisoner violence and it can also result in assaults against our staff, specifically given the content and… it undoubtedly would have resulted in very significant overdoses and potentially deaths within the prison population.’

An IPS spokesperson told the MoS: ‘The Irish Prison Service does not comment on security or operational matters’.