A wave of violence in the District of Columbia and Prince George’s County left four men dead and two men critically injured within a 12-hour period stretching from late Wednesday night through Thursday morning.
The two Thursday morning homicides in the District, not far from Union Station on the unit block of K Street, NW, were the 117th and 118th of this year, pushing the year’s total to a nine percent increase over the same period in 2007.
District police identified one victim as Johnquon Wright, 18, who police say they were already looking for because he had information on a two-week-old shooting on North Capitol Street. The other victim was not identified, but witnesses said he looked to be in his 20s.
The shootings, which happened around 10 a.m., were nothing new for neighborhood long wrought by violence – there was a homicide at the same address in September 2007.
One neighbor who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals said, “I’ve been living here 16 years, I’m just tired of seeing young black men kill themselves.”
But Thursday’s shootings also come at a time when the area is undergoing change. Nearby low-income housing is being plowed under to make way for more pricey homes.
In Prince George’s County twelve hours earlier, Leon Albert Maiden, 38, of District Heights, became the first to fall prey to gunfire in the string of homicides.
Police believe he was shot to death in an attempted carjacking around 10 p.m. Wednesday while sitting in his car on the 7700 block of Landover Road in Hyattsville. Police found him slumped over his steering wheel.
Less than 20 minutes later, 19-year-old Denver Kenneth Cannedy of Capitol Heights, is believed to have gotten in an argument before he was shot to death on the 6100 block of Old Central Avenue in Upper Marlboro, county police said. He was found lying in the street and later died at a nearby hospital.
At 10:30 p.m. Wednesday two more men were shot, one in Prince George’s, the other in the District.
A fight that began on the 5400 block of 56th Place in Riverdale spilled over onto the 5300 block of Riverdale Park where it escalated to gunfire, leaving one man severely wounded, Prince George’s police said.
A 22-year-old was shot while sitting in his car at the intersection of Central and Tunic Avenues in Capitol Heights. Police said he was recovering in a local hospital.
