Local
Killings spiked in SE D.C. during inauguration week
By: Bill Myers
Examiner Staff Writer
February 6, 2009
As tens of thousands partied at inaugural balls across Washington on the night of Jan. 20, Terrance Johnson was shot dead for his shoes. The 26-year-old died in a parking lot near his apartment in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods.
His home, the Meadowbrook Apartments, a high-rise building in the 3500 block of Sixth Street SE, typically has off-duty police officers patrolling the grounds.
“The night of the homicide we had no off-duty officers working due to the inauguration,” property manager Cynthia Bertolotti told police Assistant Chief Diane Groomes in a Feb. 2 e-mail obtained by The Examiner.
Every police officer in the city was ordered to work 12-hour shifts for the days leading up to and following President Obama’s inauguration. Hundreds of officers were ordered to cancel off-duty job assignments and were instead concentrated in D.C.’s downtown and bar districts.
Critics — including Councilman Phil Mendelson, D-At Large, and police union chairman Kris Baumann — had warned city leaders that the deployment and D.C.’s extended bar hours would leave vulnerable neighborhoods further exposed.
Between Jan. 19 and Jan. 24 — the days when the officers were working their inaugural assignments — there were four homicides in Ward 8, police statistics show.
D.C.’s eighth ward, where Johnson lived and died, is the city’s most violent. But inauguration week was deadlier than usual. According to D.C. crime statistics, the ward averaged about one homicide per week last year.
According to court papers, police learned about Johnson’s death thanks to ShotSpotter technology, which alerts authorities when someone fires a gun. Officers found his body in a parking lot, not far from his car. His shoes had been stripped off his feet.
After his shooting, building manager Bertolotti asked Groomes for crime cameras on the premises and also asked her to step up patrols.
“Please consider this,” she wrote, “for the safety of all our residents, employees and children in the area.”
His home, the Meadowbrook Apartments, a high-rise building in the 3500 block of Sixth Street SE, typically has off-duty police officers patrolling the grounds.
“The night of the homicide we had no off-duty officers working due to the inauguration,” property manager Cynthia Bertolotti told police Assistant Chief Diane Groomes in a Feb. 2 e-mail obtained by The Examiner.
Every police officer in the city was ordered to work 12-hour shifts for the days leading up to and following President Obama’s inauguration. Hundreds of officers were ordered to cancel off-duty job assignments and were instead concentrated in D.C.’s downtown and bar districts.
Critics — including Councilman Phil Mendelson, D-At Large, and police union chairman Kris Baumann — had warned city leaders that the deployment and D.C.’s extended bar hours would leave vulnerable neighborhoods further exposed.
Between Jan. 19 and Jan. 24 — the days when the officers were working their inaugural assignments — there were four homicides in Ward 8, police statistics show.
D.C.’s eighth ward, where Johnson lived and died, is the city’s most violent. But inauguration week was deadlier than usual. According to D.C. crime statistics, the ward averaged about one homicide per week last year.
According to court papers, police learned about Johnson’s death thanks to ShotSpotter technology, which alerts authorities when someone fires a gun. Officers found his body in a parking lot, not far from his car. His shoes had been stripped off his feet.
After his shooting, building manager Bertolotti asked Groomes for crime cameras on the premises and also asked her to step up patrols.
“Please consider this,” she wrote, “for the safety of all our residents, employees and children in the area.”
