The MPD responded to reports of people brandishing weapons from a car Saturday afternoon.

Tim Evanson / Flickr

The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department says one of its officers shot and killed Kevin Hargraves-Shird, 31, during a confrontation in the Brightwood Park neighborhood Saturday afternoon.

Hargraves-Shird was armed, according to Executive Assistant Police Chief Ashan M. Benedict during a press conference, although he couldn’t definitively say whether Hargraves-Shird pointed his gun at the officer before being fatally shot. The incident along the 200 block of Madison Street NW is still being investigated.

Benedict also said Hargraves-Shird appeared to be connected to an earlier shooting on Saturday. At 4 p.m., Benedict said officers responded to a shooting along Georgia Ave. and Longfellow St. NW, where individuals in two cars fired at a group of people who shot back. Two men at the scene were shot.

While officers canvassed the area, Benedict said police received calls from residents who reported seeing a white sedan with multiple people who were armed inside. The car did not match the description of cars involved in the earlier shooting nearly a mile away, but police are still drawing a connection for reasons they have not shared with the media. When a responding officer spotted the white sedan and followed it to the intersection of 2nd and Madison Streets NW, the three occupants of the car fled. Benedict said the officer “engaged” one of the men, who police later identified in a statement as Hargraves-Shird. He also said the officer shouted “gun, gun, gun” and gave commands, but Hargraves-Shird did not comply, and the officer ultimately fired his gun at him one time. Benedict said police retrieved a gun from Hargraves-Shird, and three other guns from the scene, but when asked by a reporter, couldn’t say for sure whether Hargraves-Shird pointed his gun at the officer.

Hargraves-Shird was taken to a local hospital before succumbing to his injuries and being pronounced dead. The family of Hargraves-Shird appears to dispute the police’s accounts of Saturday’s incident. Harriet’s Dreams, a Black-led abolitionist group that’s active in local social justice causes, shared on Twitter that his family is seeking answers.

The shooting comes on the heels of a deadly year. There have been 126 homicides so far this year, a 12% increase compared over this point in time last year. Brightwood Park, in particular, has been plagued by violent, gun-related crime and was added to the city’s Cure The Streets violence prevention program last November.

“We’ve had a rough few days,” said Benedict on Saturday. “Since Wednesday, we had 13 shootings, 21 victims, and five fatalities. It’s been across the city.”

There have been dangerous interactions between police and the public as well, including two separate incidents this year where police fatally shot two men. On July 16, Commander Jason Bagshaw fatally shot 23 year-old Lazarus Wilson. Bagshaw, who some locals say is known for aggressive police tactics, was off duty at the time of the shooting, but confronted Wilson when police say he saw the young man brandishing a gun.

MPD has not yet released the name of the officer who fatally shot Hargraves-Shird, nor that officer’s body-camera footage, but the department has five business days to do so under D.C. law. According to the Washington Post, the officer who fatally shot Hargraves-Shird is on administrative leave, which is standard MPD policy.

This post has been updated to share a tweet from Harriet’s Dreams, as well as the perspective of Kevin Hargraves-Shird’s family. This post has also been updated to correct the spelling of Hargraves-Shird’s last name. DCist/WAMU used the spelling provided by the D.C. police in its press release, but has since confirmed the correct spelling with Hargraves-Shird’s sister. 

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