3 men plead guilty to 2015 shooting in DC that killed American U. grad

WASHINGTON — Three D.C. men have pleaded guilty to a 2015 shootout that turned deadly when a local college graduate was killed by stray gunfire.

Andre Dudley, 22; Marcus King, 22; and Christopher Proctor, 28, will be sentenced on Aug. 13 for single counts each of voluntary manslaughter while armed and two counts each of assault with a dangerous weapon.

On Aug. 15, 2015, Matthew Shlonsky, 23, was walking to a concert at the Howard Theatre in D.C. when he was hit by a stray bullet from a shooting that erupted in front of a liquor store near the intersection of 7th and S streets Northwest.

Shlonsky, a 2014 American University graduate, was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Dudley was targeting two members of the Ninth Street crew by firing from a vehicle he was driving, with his head and weapon arm extending from the vehicle’s sunroof, prosecutors said in describing the shooting.

Gang members King and Proctor, while returning fire, endangered two people pushing children in strollers, prosecutors said in a news release. That group was not harmed, but prosecutors said the gunfire put the pedestrians and children in the “zone of harm.”

For their roles in what happened, King has agreed to a prison term of 15 to 20 years; Proctor’s plea agrees to a prison term of 12 to 14 years.

A judge will ultimately decide Dudley’s sentence that also includes a guilty plea for last month’s nonfatal stabbing of a fellow inmate in D.C. jail on May 17. He could get a total of 20 years and four months in prison.

Kristi King

Kristi King is a veteran reporter who has been working in the WTOP newsroom since 1990. She covers everything from breaking news to consumer concerns and the latest medical developments.

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