Utah Woman Accused of Assaulting Multiple Federal Officers is Indicted

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah – A federal grand jury in Salt Lake City, Utah, returned an indictment Feb. 14, 2024, charging a Salt Lake County woman with federal crimes after she allegedly assaulted multiple U.S. Marshals, while resisting arrest. 

According to court documents, Melissa Lynn Trotter, 24, of Sandy, Utah, allegedly assaulted multiple federal law enforcement officers on February 7, 2024, during the arrest of a wanted fugitive. That evening, Deputy United States Marshals and Task Force Officers of the District of Utah’s Violent Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team (VFAST) attempted to arrest a fugitive outside a CVS located in West Valley City, Utah. Trotter was in a vehicle with the fugitive when the fugitive exited the vehicle and entered the CVS. When the fugitive returned to the vehicle, officers surrounded it with their vehicles. While blocking the vehicle, officers activated their red and blue flashing emergency law enforcement lights, and some officers exited their vehicles and identified themselves as U.S. Marshals. Despite law enforcements calls to Trotter to turn the vehicle off and drop the keys outside the window, she refused to comply. 

As alleged in court documents, Trotter placed the vehicle in reverse and forcibly tried to back out of the parking space. Trotter assaulted two federal officers by ramming the officers’ vehicle as they attempted to block her exit. Trotter then drove over a parking barrier and on the CVS parking lot customer sidewalk as she attempted to escape through a vacant stall. Trotter then rammed head-on into the front passenger side of another federal law enforcement vehicle, that had blocked that parking stall. A third Deputy U.S. Marshal positioned his vehicle to block Trotter from escaping. Subsequently Trotter stopped the vehicle and she and the fugitive were taken into custody.  

Trotter is charged with three counts of assault upon a federal officer involving the use of a deadly weapon. Her initial court appearance on the indictment is scheduled for Feb. 16, 2024, at 11:45 a.m. in courtroom 8.4 before a U.S. Magistrate Judge at the Orrin G. Hatch United States District Courthouse in downtown Salt Lake City. 

U.S. Attorney, Trina A. Higgins, of the District of Utah made the announcement.

The U.S. Marshals Service is investigating the case.

Assistant United States Attorney Kevin Sundwall of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah is prosecuting the case.