WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors have decided they will not file charges against a Metro Transit officer who shot and killed an armed man last summer.
Federal prosecutors announced Monday there was not enough evidence to charge the unnamed Metro Transit officer whom they found acted in self-defense when he shot and killed 21-year-old Sidney Washington Jr. on July 4.
Officers responded to the Deanwood Metro Station in Northeast D.C. around 10:30 that night for a report of two rival gangs setting off fireworks at each other and into the station, prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney for the District Channing Phillips said in a statement.
Investigators said the officer saw Washington fire a handgun near a large group of people. The officer pulled up in an unmarked car identifying himself as police.
That’s when prosecutors said that Washington fired, hitting the officer’s car and the two exchanged gunfire. Washington was killed. An autopsy found he was shot five times.
