White House staffer Kalpen Modi -- yes, that's Kal Penn -- robbed at gunpoint in Northwest D.C.













Kalpen Modi. (Chris Pizzello/AP)

Kal Penn, the actor-turned-Obama-staffer, was robbed at gunpoint in Northwest Washington early Tuesday morning, an official confirmed today.

A D.C. police official told our colleague Paul Duggan that Penn (who these days goes by his birth name, Kalpen Modi) was accosted around 1:30 a.m. near 15th and S streets in the Dupont Circle area by a gunman, who walked up to him and took a wallet and other belongings.

It was "a basic street robbery," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the department typically does not discuss victims or witnesses by name. No one was hurt in the incident, which was first reported by TMZ.

Penn, 32, an ardent Obama campaigner, gave up his role on the hit series "House" last year to take a job as an associate director in the White House's Office of Public Engagement. But he's scheduled to return to Hollywood later this year, to resume his acting career with a role in a new "Harold and Kumar" Christmas movie.

UPDATED 3 p.m. with location of robbery.