Three people have been arrested in connection with a shooting Tuesday afternoon in Southwest D.C. that killed a man, left four people suffering from gunshot wounds and injured another man, according to D.C. police.
Matthew Miller, 32, of Southwest D.C., died at the scene, according to police.
The other two men were transported to local hospitals by D.C. Fire and EMS. They had non-life-threatening injuries, according to police.
Three men who later walked into a hospital with non-life-threatening gunshot wounds were all arrested and charged with first-degree murder while armed, police said.
These men, all from Southeast D.C., were identified by police as Keshawn Lavender, 22; Deandre Sams, 27; and Raymond Mathis, 36.
“I am grateful for the hard work and professionalism of our First District Patrol Officers and Homicide Detectives to quickly conduct a thorough investigation leading to the arrest of the suspects,” Acting Chief Pamela A. Smith said in a news release. “The Metropolitan Police Department is working around the clock to protect this city and because of their dedication on this case, we were able to make numerous homicide arrests less than 12 hours later.”
Assistant Chief Carlos Heraud said during a news conference Tuesday afternoon that officers responded to the shooting at around 4:15 p.m. at a residence on the 200 block of M Street SW, a few blocks west of Nationals Park. Officers found two men with gunshot wounds at the scene.
“Once again, this investigation is very early,” Heraud said. “What we do know is that it appears all the parties involved, or all the parties I have mentioned thus far, know each other in some way, shape or form.”
One man was pronounced dead at the scene, and the other male victim with gunshot wounds was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, according to Heraud.
One other man had injuries from falling down in the residence during the shooting, but he was not suffering from gunshot wounds.
Three other males who were injured in the shooting checked themselves into a nearby hospital, according to authorities. Their injuries are not life-threatening.
Heraud said police believe all the victims knew each other.
One neighbor that has lived in the Waterfront neighborhood since 2014 told WTOP that she still believes it is a safe neighborhood and that “it’s not necessarily the people that claim these cities for generations and decades” that are committing crimes in the area.
“It happens,” she said. “That’s the beautiful thing about the neighborhood, it’s diverse, it’s all types of backgrounds. But there’s also going to be elements of crime.”
She said she does not plan to move and that she believes many people committing crimes in D.C. are from the surrounding area and not the District itself.
“It happens everywhere,” she said. “And the unfortunate thing, sometimes these people, they don’t live here … I just love this city so much, so I can’t really give credit to it really being something that’s just isolated, people that knew each other. It happens.”
Police have not identified any suspects so far.
“If and when we do get any information for lookouts on suspects … we’ll make sure to go to the media as soon as possible,” Heraud said.
D.C. police plans to release additional details later on Thursday.
WTOP’s Luke Garrett and Sandra Jones contributed to this story.
