Simms pleads guilty to murder in South Capitol Street shootings

One of the men accused in one of the District’s deadliest shootings in decades has pleaded guilty to five counts of second-degree murder and two counts of conspiracy and is cooperating with police.

Nathaniel Simms, 26, admitted that he was one of four men who piled into a rented minivan on March 30 and went on a shooting rampage in Southeast Washington that left four young people dead and five wounded. Simms said he leaned the barrel of an AK-47 out the window of the Chrysler Town and Country van and fired into a crowd of mourners coming from a funeral.