Capitol Police Find a Guillotine in a Pickup Truck — That's Not Even the Weirdest Part of the Story

Have you ever been scrolling through news headlines and had to do a double-take because the story seemed too bizarre to be true?

That's what happened with this story and this headline: "Guillotine in pickup truck parked near U.S. Capitol building prompts driver's arrest." 

Now, Washington, D.C., used to be the murder capital of the United States under its infamous former Mayor Marion Barry, so it's a city that likes its firearms. Gun violence we're used to; guillotines, not so much. 

A California man by the name of Philan-Tam-Duy Le, 35, was arrested Tuesday after U.S. Capitol Police discovered that the black pickup truck he'd parked near the U.S. Capitol and Supreme Court had a guillotine in its bed.

Le apparently made the cross-country trek from California to Washington, D.C., with the medieval execution device along for the ride.

Investigators with the Capitol Police are now looking into Le's background in an effort to figure out why he traveled to the nation's capital in the first place – and why the guillotine. The California man was arrested for carrying a dangerous weapon.

A guillotine spotted sitting in the bed of a pickup truck parked near the US Capitol Building and the Supreme Court building prompted the arrest of its driver on Tuesday, officials said.

READ MORE: https://t.co/ZtvwBHxztY pic.twitter.com/ZnESWyUjy2

— 7News DC (@7NewsDC) August 25, 2026

Le had parked his pickup in the 100 block of East Capitol Street, sandwiched between the U.S. Capitol and the Supreme Court. Pretty much exactly where you'd expect to find someone with a guillotine to be parked if the owner had a vendetta against someone in the political world.

But, it wasn't the guillotine that actually caught the attention of law enforcement, it was the parking job. The truck, it turns out, was illegally parked.

It's unclear who or what was Le's target – or if he even had one – but it appears that he was able to drive 2,500 miles across the country with a guillotine in the back of his truck and not one other law enforcement agency noticed until he parked weirdly in D.C.

For now, the motive remains a mystery. But, if Le did come to Washington with some nefarious plans for his guillotine, it appears he was ultimately foiled by something far more powerful: Capitol Hill's strict parking regulations.

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