An early-morning shooting outside a Suitland apartment complex Thursday left one dead and two others wounded, in the fourth homicide in March after a double-digit spate at the beginning of the year. Detectives are investigating the shooting as a possible botched robbery, said police spokesman Cpl. Henry Tippett. The shooting took place on Victory Lane at the Windsor Crossing apartments shortly after 4 a.m., said spokeswoman Cpl. Erica Johnson.
One man was pronounced dead on the scene and another was taken to a local hospital, Johnson said. A third gunshot victim, a female injured in the incident, showed up Thursday morning at a D.C. police station several miles away from the crime scene, said Cpl. Larry Johnson.
Police have not released the name, age or residence of the man killed, pending family notification. The conditions of the other two victims have also not been released.
No arrests have been made, Tippett said.
The cul-de-sac where the shooting occurred is made up of well-kept apartments built in 2004. There are 128 two- and three-bedroom units at the location off Suitland Road, according to an online listing.
A police officer patrolling the apartment complex Thursday afternoon instructed a reporter to leave, saying the apartment management did not want news media on the private property. A woman who answered the phone at Windsor Crossing declined to comment.
The shooting was the fourth homicide in the county this month and the 24th this year. The most recent was that of a 57-year-old man shot and killed March 19 in the parking lot of Franks Tavern nightclub in Capitol Heights, Tippett said.
In January, the county saw 16 homicides. Police said many of those killings involved drugs and were not random.
In the aftermath of that spike, police brought in help from federal agents and conducted saturation patrols of high-density crime areas.
Law enforcement officials, who have said they are understaffed, will see their ranks expand next year under the fiscal 2012 budget proposed by County Executive Rushern Baker. It calls for adding 51 sworn officers to the police force, including one new homicide investigator, and 10 new deputy sheriffs to reduce the county’s 50,000 outstanding criminal warrants.
