Three men were killed and eight wounded across the District during a four-hour span as a bloody year continues in the area. Over four hours Wednesday night and into early Thursday, D.C. police officers were scrambling to all points of the city responding to reports of people shooting or knifing each other.
Investigators do not think any of the killings are related, but they are investigating to see if there are any connections, said D.C. police spokesman Officer Hugh Carew. “We don’t know yet,” he said.
Before the bloody night, homicides in the Washington region were up by 17 percent for the first three months of the year, fueled mostly by 27 killings in Prince George’s County. The District is now up to 26 homicides this year, the same as this point last year, police said.
The first slaying Wednesday occurred around 9:40 p.m. in the turnaround Petworth neighborhood in Northwest Washington. Police responded to a report of a shooting in the rear of 719 Quincy St. NW, and found a man suffering multiple gunshot wounds to the face and chest, said Officer Anthony Clay. The victim was later identified as 22-year-old Shonell Corriea, of Northwest D.C.
Around 11:20 p.m., there were two more slayings, this time in a rough Southeast Washington neighborhood. Two men were shot and killed in the 700 block of Yuma Street SE. Police identified the victims as 20-year-old Joshua Ruffin and 22-year-old Reginald L. Williams Jr.
No arrests have been made in the slayings.
Wednesday night’s violence began around 9:15 p.m., at 1295 Brentwood Road NE. Two men were shot, one to the right hand and the other grazed in the left shoulder, police said.
About 9:50 p.m., in the 900 block of Wahler Place SE, two more men were shot and taken to the hospital. One man was shot in the head and remained in critical condition. The other man was shot in the back and is in serious condition.
Around 12:45 p.m. three men were stabbed in the 1300 block of Trinidad Avenue NE, including the suspect, who has been arrested. One man was stabbed in the chest, a second man tried to grab the knife and suffered lacerations to his hands, and the suspect suffered stab wounds to the chest, right leg and back of the hand.
The man who was stabbed in the chest drove himself to the Washington Hospital Center. The other two were taken in ambulances, police said.
Around 10:30 p.m., a man was stabbed in the trendy 1100 block of H Street NE. He suffered lacerations to the throat and was admitted to a hospital in stable condition, police said.
