[7] President Donald Trump spread false and unfounded conspiracy theories about Gugino in his response to the incident on Twitter.

[8][9][10][11] On February 11, 2021, Erie County district attorney John Flynn announced that a grand jury had dismissed the charges against the officers.

[12] Martin Gugino, born October 15, 1944, is an American peace activist associated with the Catholic Worker Movement.

[13] He worked with the Western New York Peace Center after his retirement, and was also interested in other political issues like Guantánamo Bay and climate change.

[14] During the George Floyd protests in New York state, the Mayor of Buffalo, Byron Brown, instituted a daily curfew in the city from 8:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. Not long after the curfew began on June 4, Buffalo Police Department officers and New York State Police officers swept through Niagara Square, where a protest was winding down.

[34] Cuomo asked why the officers' actions were necessary, described their behavior as "just fundamentally offensive and frightening",[31] and said the city of Buffalo should consider firing them and carry out a criminal investigation.

[1] On June 10, Brown announced impending changes to Buffalo police protocol, including implementing "appearance tickets" for non-violent protesters rather than having them face arrest and creating a "public protection unit" to replace the emergency response team, with an emphasis on being better-suited to handle large-scale protests.

[39][40][41] On June 4, 8:50 p.m., the Buffalo police department stated that "during [a] skirmish involving protesters, one person was injured when he tripped & fell"; according to The Washington Post, a video of the incident showed that this claim was false.

[15][25] The Buffalo police department later said that officers who were not directly involved in the incident had given the description of Gugino's supposedly having "tripped".

[25] By June 4, 11:05 p.m., the two officers who had pushed Gugino were suspended without pay, with the Buffalo police chief ordering for an investigation of the incident.

[3][46] Following an arraignment that day, at which McCabe and Torgalski pleaded not guilty, they were released without bail while awaiting a felony hearing.

[2][46][47] Erie County district attorney John Flynn announced on February 11, 2021, that a grand jury had dismissed the charges against the officers.

[8][10] Governor Cuomo sharply criticized the president during his daily news briefing, saying if Trump "ever feels a moment of decency, he should apologize for that tweet.

[57] In his work for OANN, Rouz has spread conspiracy theories and displayed favorable stances towards the Russian government.

[59] The blog post, written by someone using the pseudonym "Sundance", claimed without evidence that Gugino is a "professional agitator and Antifa provocateur".

[60] That afternoon, OANN founder and chairman Robert Herring Sr. tweeted to Trump, "we won't let you down as your source for credible news!

[61] On June 13, protesters in San Diego, California, gathered outside OANN headquarters,[62] where Herring Sr. challenged the crowd to prove the story was false.

[64] The lawsuit claims that several of Gugino's constitutional rights were violated, and the suit also desires to hold the city accountable for "concealing, excusing and/or condoning the unlawful use of force.