Chief Pamela Smith held back tears as she stood by the D.C. Police Memorial on Thursday afternoon.
She had flown overnight from California, where she had been attending a law enforcement conference Wednesday, when she heard the news officer Wayne David had died while retrieving a suspect’s weapon. The police chief said she wanted it to be a day to remember David and his passion for the job.
“He grew up here. He was an honorable man,” she said.
“This is hard, not only for investigator David’s family,” she said. “But it’s also very, very hard for the members of the Metropolitan Police Department.”
David was attempting to recover a suspect’s discarded firearm when it discharged, shooting him in the head, police said.
David spent 25 years on the force, most recently in the Violent Crimes Suppression Division. Chief Smith described him as an affable man, “not really the rough and rugged kind of police officers that we might see from time to time doing the kind of investigative, violent crime suppression.”
Smith said D.C. police, the FBI and ATF are offering a reward of $50,000 for information that leads to the suspect who discarded the weapon.
Police said Wednesday around 5:40 p.m., members of the MPD Violent Crimes Suppression Division were in the 4500 block of Quarles Street Northeast, when they witnessed a man exiting a suspicious vehicle. Police approached the man, who then fled toward DC-295 and discarded a weapon down a storm drain on the side of the road.
The man jumped down from the service road, then got on the back of a motorcycle and was able to outrun police. The suspect is described as a man with long dreads, last seen wearing a white shirt and light blue shorts, police said.
Chief Smith also called on the suspect to turn himself in.
D.C. police Executive Assistant Chief Jeffery Carroll said at a news conference Wednesday night that David was shot while trying to retrieve the firearm.
Chief Smith said David had recovered many illegal guns during his career and there will be an investigation to determine exactly what happened.
Smith said ATF had possession of the discarded weapon and that the serial number had been scratched off.
Officer David leaves behind a son and daughter. His name will be etched on the D.C. Police Memorial Wall.
Police are asking anyone with information in this case to call them at 202-727-9099.
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