Story highlights Turkish leader's entourage filmed brawling with protesters outside embassy in Washington, DC

Erdogan's bodyguards and aides have a history of run-ins with protesters

(CNN) The bloody brawl this week on Washington, DC's Embassy Row is not the first time members of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan's entourage have been filmed fighting in public.

little more than a year ago in the same city, journalists accused members of Erdogan's security detail of man-handling them and cursing them at a speech the Turkish president gave at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.

Outside the event on March 31, 2016, DC police had to intervene to separate Erdogan supporters and protesters in what police described as a "skirmish involving demonstrators."

Erdogan referred to the protests as he addressed the audience inside: "They are shouting, but they don't know what's going on back in Turkey. The freedom of expression has been regulated within the clauses of the Turkish constitution ... They are pretending that I have illegitimacy."

Meanwhile Brookings staff had to step in to protect a credentialed journalist from being evicted from the venue by Turkish security. Another journalist, Woodrow Wilson fellow Amberin Zaman, accused a Turkish security guard of calling her "a whore."

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