D.C. Police said an arrest has been made in an Oct. 6 shooting on an elementary school athletic field in Capitol Hill.
They have charged Antonio Hawley Jr., 18, of Southeast D.C., in the death of Aaron Wiggins, 26, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland.
Court documents describe a pickup football game at Watkins Elementary School on 12th Street Southeast filled with trash talk, anger and emotions that got out of control.
Witnesses said Wiggins was playing against some former teammates who had just kicked him off their team because he talked too much trash on the field. After scoring a touchdown at the end of the game that night, witnesses described a contentious situation with lots of cursing and insults.
When the lights on the field went dark, Wiggins went to his gym bag to pack up his things, while witnesses said Hawley reached into his own bag, pulled out a gun, walked toward Wiggins and started firing. Police recovered 17 shells left by the gun.
Charging documents suggest some of the witnesses police spoke with in the weeks after the shooting may have been less than forthcoming about everything they knew about the shooting, with police reminding them on multiple occasions that the only trouble they could face related to the case was not telling the truth to investigators.
Eventually, the investigation led detectives to Hawley, also known as “Slick,” who was initially questioned by police two months ago on Oct. 22.
In addition to witnesses, police used Hawley’s publicly available Instagram account to tie him to the weapon and some of the personal items also connected to the shooting.
The same gun may also be connected to an armed carjacking of a ride-share driver days after the Oct. 6 shooting. Police said the phone used to hail that driver was given to Hawley by one of the witnesses who was also at Watkins Elementary the night of the killing.
Hawley, who already had been charged several times as a juvenile, is also facing larceny charges in Fairfax County. He’s being held without bond in D.C.
