"
We screwed up."
Charges against antiwar protester Cindy Sheehan, who was arrested after an incident involving a T-shirt she wore to the State of the Union address, will be dropped, officials told NBC News Wednesday.
U.S. Capitol Police took Sheehan away in handcuffs and charged her with unlawful conduct, a misdemeanor, when she showed up to President Bush's address Tuesday night wearing a shirt that read, "2245 Dead. How many more?" -- a reference to the number of soldiers killed in Iraq.
But Capitol Police will ask the U.S. attorney's office to drop the charges, NBC News' Mike Viqueira reported Wednesday.
"We screwed up," a top Capitol Police official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
He said Sheehan didn't violate any rules or laws.
Sheehan, whose son Casey died in Iraq, was not the only one ejected from the House gallery. The wife of a powerful Republican congressman was also asked to leave, but she was not arrested.
Beverly Young, wife of Rep. C.W. Bill Young of Florida -- chairman of the House Defense Appropriations subcommittee -- was removed from the gallery because she was wearing a T-shirt that read, "Support the Troops -- Defending Our Freedom."
The Capitol Police official said officers never should have approached Young.