NBA Player-Turned-Sacramento Mayor Punches Pie-Throwing Activist

Outgoing Sacramento mayor Kevin Johnson, whose time in office has been defined by political corruption, free speech tampering, and reports of sexual abuse, repeatedly punched a protester at a charity dinner event on Wednesday night.

According to the East Bay Express, 32-year-old Sean Thompson approached Johnson during the meal and “tagged” his face with a coconut cream pie. “He looked at me for a moment and then he started swinging,” Thompson later told the Sacramento Bee. “Then a bunch of other people joined in and started swinging on me.”

Reports say Mayor Johnson punched Thompson more than half a dozen times, beating him to a “bloody pulp.” The pie-thrower was expected to be charged Friday with felony assault.

“I felt the pressure to do something that I thought would at least symbolize and embarrass him,” Thompson said from jail, where he’s being held on $100,000 bail. “I still think it was a very appropriate response to a politician who acts the way that Kevin Johnson has acted.”

A statement from Johnson’s office asserted that the mayor was acting in self defense. “The Mayor was attacked and grabbed from behind and struck with what we afterwards learned was a pie from an unknown man,” the statement read. “He reacted in self-defense like most people do when attacked by an unknown object.”

Johnson, who played thirteen seasons for the Phoenix Suns, entered office in 2008 and was re-elected in 2012. Last October, after Deadspin published documentation of Johnson’s alleged child molestation, Thompson announced he wouldn’t run for a third term.