High-ranking DC officer suspected of improperly communicating with Proud Boys leader, report says

• A DC police lieutenant is under investigation for suspected contacts with a Proud Boys leader, per The Washington Post.
• Shane Lamond, a 22-year veteran of the force, was suspended pending investigation, The Post said.

A high-ranking Washington, DC police officer was suspected of communicating improperly with a Proud Boys leader, and suspended pending an investigation, The Washington Post reported.

DC Police Chief Robert J. Contee III declined to name the officer in a news conference on Wednesday but said the Metropolitan Police Department, FBI, and the Department of Justice were investigating.

Four law-enforcement officials familiar with the investigation told The Post that the officer under investigation was Lt. Shane Lamond, a 22-year veteran of the force who worked in the intelligence branch.

Lamond is suspected of communicating, on multiple occasions, with Enrique Tarrio, a prominent figure of the Proud Boys, which the FBI described as having "ties to white nationalism."

The exact nature of Lamond and Tarrio's supposed contacts and when they began is unclear, The Post reported.

Tarrio told The Post that his contact with Lamond was professional and that Lamond was only a "liaison officer" for when the group held rallies.

Tarrio said he would notify Lamond when his group planned to hold rallies in DC and that Lamond would, in turn, tell him the location of counter-demonstrators.

"I only told him, 'We're coming into town and we're going to hold this protest.' That's as far as the relationship went," Tarrio told The Post.

"They're just trying to get anybody at this point," he added.

In the run-up to January 6, 2021, Lamond, as an intelligence officer, was copied in on a number of emails between organizers of that day's rally and the National Parks Service, documents made public as part of the House committee's Capitol-riot investigation show.

During Wednesday's press conference, Contee declined to answer when a reporter asked whether the police was investigating if Lamond passed information about the January 6 rally to the Proud Boys, the Daily Beast reported.

"I can't say that. I don't know that to be fact," Contee said, according to The Daily Beast.

Tarrio did not attend any events on January 6, including the pro-Trump rally that preceded the Capitol riot. He was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of destruction of property in connection to the burning of a church's Black Lives Matter banner two days prior.

The Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia and Tarrio did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.