Photojournalist and filmmaker Will Allen-DuPraw was targeted with multiple crowd-control munitions while covering protests outside a federal detention facility in Newark, New Jersey, on May 30, 2026.
Protests outside the Delaney Hall immigration detention facility began May 22, when many detainees went on a hunger strike. Members of Congress, state and local lawmakers and rights groups have alleged dire conditions at the facility.
Federal officers responded to the protests with chemical irritants, physical force and arrests, as did state police in the days that followed.
The Department of Homeland Security has denied allegations of detainee mistreatment.
Allen-DuPraw told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was on assignment for Status Coup on May 30, documenting the New Jersey State Police response to protests outside the facility that night.
“At one point there was a 30-to-50-foot gap between the main line of protesters and the line of police,” he said, “and I was somewhere in the middle of that gap — forward from the protesters, but not at the police line by any means — and was standing fairly still, taking photos, when all of a sudden a series of flash bangs went off at my feet.”
He said that at least three stun grenades exploded at his feet, and that he could feel shrapnel brush past his pant legs.
“I could feel the force of them at my ankle, and then, of course, my ears were ringing from it as well,” Allen-DuPraw added.
Later that evening, the photojournalist was targeted again.
He told the Tracker he was standing in the gap between protesters and police, as were two or three protesters at a distance from him. Then, state police officers began firing crowd-control munitions toward the demonstrators.
Photojournalist Will Allen-DuPraw captured an image of the camera attached to his hip holster after a New Jersey State Police officer shot him with a pepper ball munition amid protests outside a federal detention center in Newark on May 30, 2026.
— Will Allen-DuPraw via Status Coup/@will.allendupraw“They started shooting pepper balls; not super rapidly, where they were just trying to do general crowd dispersal, but shooting one, two. It felt more like aimed shots at initially the protesters, but then also at me,” Allen-DuPraw said. “They managed to shoot the camera that I had on my hip with a pepper ball, so that it was completely covered in that white pepper powder.”
He said that while he may have been struck by other pepper balls in that moment, he can’t be certain because he wasn’t left with any bruising.
After making his way to a nearby sidewalk, Allen-DuPraw said he found someone with a battery-powered air blower that helped him clear off a lot of the loose powder.
The New Jersey State Police Office of Public Information did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
In a statement posted to X early May 30, New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport wrote that state police were clearing the area outside Delaney Hall because a small number of people were blocking the pathway for law enforcement vehicles. It did not address the use of force against members of the press.
This content originally appeared on U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database and was authored by U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database.