UpdatedTue, Apr 27, 2021 at 11:45 am ET Reply Metropolitan Police Department officers "kettled," or corralled, a group of protesters at the corner of 12th and L streets in D.C. on Jan. 20, 2017, the day of President Donald Trump's inauguration. (Mark Hand/Patch) WASHINGTON, DC — The D.C. government will pay $1.6 million to settle two lawsuits that alleged Metropolitan Police Department officers unlawfully detained more than 200 protesters in mass arrests the day of Donald Trump's presidential inauguration in January 2017. The demonstrators — represented by the ACLU of the District of Columbia and Jeffrey L. Light — alleged that D.C. police violated the constitutional rights of journalists, legal observers and protesters by indiscriminately rounding them up in downtown Washington on Jan. 20, 2017.