D.C. police have captured two men they say are responsible for a string of violent armed robberies in trendy Washington neighborhoods, including that of a man who was shot near the Washington Convention Center. One of the suspects has been identified as the dreadlocked predator who stalked young people from the shadows in upper Northwest Washington. Law enforcement sources say the pair was involved in as many as 15 armed robberies since the beginning of May, including at least four stickups in which a gun was fired.
D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier gave a presentation about the capture of the suspects to Mayor Vince Gray and his public safety team at police headquarters last week. Lanier said the men have been charged in one of the armed robberies, but she will not release the suspects’ identities until indictments are handed down.
“The subjects were taken into custody… and charged in one of the offenses; however, they have been positively linked to the related robbery pattern,” Lanier said in the statement.
According to police sources and charging documents obtained by The Washington Examiner, the defendants are Terrance J. Walker, 27, and Stefon Summers of Northeast Washington.
Detectives developed the duo as suspects in the convention center area shooting after stolen credit cards were used to purchase tickets to an amusement park, an investigating source said.
According to charging documents, around 3:30 a.m. on June 6, Walker pulled a gun on a man and woman at 7th Street and L Street.
While Walker and Summers rifled through the woman’s purse and took her property, the male victim asked, “Dude, are you kidding me, right now?”
Walker then fired a single gun into the man’s abdomen, then went through his pockets as he lay on the ground.
The victim was taken to a hospital and remained unconscious as of June 13. The bullet remained lodged in his abdomen.
Police sources said the suspects have also fired a weapon into the ground between one victim’s legs and also into the air to scare their victim into handing over their belongings. On June 2, the gun went off as the dreadlocked suspect used it to punch a student intern in Tenleytown.
Nearly three dozen witnesses are expected to be called in for a line-up later this week to see whether they can positively identify the suspects in their cases, an investigating sources said.
Four of the armed robberies occurred in the Second District along the Wisconsin Avenue corridor, eight occurred in the First Police District around Chinatown, and three took place in the Third Police District, which covers downtown, Adams Morgan and Columbia Heights areas, police said.
