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Metropolitan Police Department Officer Anthony Smith marveled as he examined a .45-caliber handgun he’d just seized from a man walking along Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE near Anacostia. “This is literally a hand cannon,” he said.
Other cops on the scene also couldn’t help but notice the gun’s size, according to body-worn camera footage of the Aug. 2, 2022, incident. “Have you been doing your bicep curls?” another officer asked Smith as he prepared to hand him the weapon by its long black grip.
But even as officers acknowledged the gun’s abnormal measurements and threatening nature, they failed to arrest the man carrying it. Mayor Muriel Bowser, MPD Chief Pamela Smith, and all manner of other city leaders have spent years emphasizing the importance of getting illegal guns off the street and arresting those who carry them, so what could possibly have motivated these cops to let this man go free?
In MPD’s view, the incident was part of an illegal conspiracy carried out by members of a specialized unit focused on curbing violent crime in Southeast D.C. Internal investigators for the department identified at least 18 instances where members of this “crime suppression team” found illegal guns but failed to arrest the people who had them, according to testimony during a lengthy police disciplinary hearing last week. MPD is now seeking to fire two of the officers—Anthony Smith and Adam Kelly—and could pursue sanctions against at least 15 others.
Then-Chief Robert Contee first disclosed the existence of an investigation into this matter in October 2022, and City Paper revealed in July 2023 that federal prosecutors were contemplating criminal charges against these officers. Dozens of criminal cases were dismissed, and several guilty verdicts were in jeopardy of getting overturned due to the involvement of the accused officers.
The United States Attorney’s Office for D.C. has since declined to prosecute Smith and Kelly, according to testimony during last week’s hearing, as well as an unidentified number of other CST members in the Seventh District. (The Seventh District is MPD’s designation for an area that includes most of Southeast.) But testimony did indicate that, at the least, the two officers whose conduct triggered this investigation in September 2022—Abdul Dieng and Imar Samaraay—remain under internal investigation, as do an unspecified number of other officers. (A USAO spokesperson did not respond to questions about the status of the criminal investigation.)
With criminal penalties off the table for Smith and Kelly, MPD has now moved to its own cumbersome internal discipline process for the two officers.
“At best, it’s lazy policing, and at worst, it’s some kind of collusion,” Captain John Terry, a watch commander in the Fourth District and one of three officers evaluating the disciplinary case, said while addressing Kelly.
For more on what these officers are accused of doing, the police union’s caustic defense of their actions, and what all this says about the climate within MPD, check out our full story online.
—Alex Koma (tips? akoma@washingtoncitypaper.com)
For 16 years, Bobbye Pratt contributed essential research that helped fuel the Washington Post’s Metro reporting, helping reporters find sources and information for everything from breaking stories to in-depth investigative projects. She died Dec. 25 at a hospital in Arlington due to complications from a fall. She was 89. [Post]
Friends and family of D.C. drug kingpin Rayful Edmond gathered at Clinton Baptist Church in Maryland Tuesday to say their final goodbyes. The 60-year-old died suddenly while on supervised release at a Bureau of Prisons-monitored home in Florida. Rev. Willie Wilson called Edmond a “beautiful” and “brilliant brother”; Wilson claimed Edmond, whose name is synonymous with the crack epidemic in D.C., was a “victim” of the federal government who used him “to destroy the Black community.” [Post]
Former D.C. police officer Michael Fanone is seeking a protective order in Prince William County against the five men who dragged him into the crowd of rioters at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and assaulted him. One of the pardoned men, Daniel Rodriguez, shocked Fanone with a stun gun and was sentenced to 12 years in prison. [NBC Washington]
Chinyere Hubbard will be the new CEO of the D.C. Chamber of Commerce, replacing Angela Franco, departed to lead the Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce. Hubbard, a native Washingtonian and Howard University grad, has worked as the chief marketing and strategic communications officer for the Greater Washington Partnership and as vice president of Events D.C. [WBJ]
By City Paper staff (tips? editor@washingtoncitypaper.com)
The D.C. Police Union feels some “dismay” over President Donald Trump’s pardon of the Jan. 6 rioters, many of whom assaulted MPD officers. Nevertheless, the union is still working with the White House to arrange the pardons of Officer Terence Sutton and Lt. Andrew Zabavsky, who were convicted of causing the fatal crash of a man they pursued in 2020, Karon Hylton-Brown, and trying to cover it up. “This can’t be happening,” Karen Hylton, the man’s mother, said upon hearing the news. [NBC Washington, WUSA9]
Trump is already reviving a fight from his first term with a new executive order prioritizing “neoclassical” architecture for new federal buildings, rather than the brutalist style of the late 20th century. “It seems likely that President Trump is going to want a classical new FBI building right on Pennsylvania Avenue—America’s Main Street,” predicts Justin Shubow, one of neoclassicism’s biggest boosters. [NPR]
The Foggy Bottom-West End Advisory Neighborhood Commission is still meeting even though a series of odd election mishaps means it doesn’t have a quorum and can’t take any official actions. “We want to at least make sure that the community knows that we are still here,” says Chair Trupti Patel. [GW Hatchet]
By Alex Koma (tips? akoma@washingtoncitypaper.com)
Restaurateur Stephen Starr has dollar signs in his eyes as the new administration arrives. [Axios]
Winter Restaurant Week has expanded to include more than 360 restaurants throughout the D.C. area. Participating eateries are offering multi-course menus for lunch ($25), brunch ($35), and dinner ($40, $55, and $65); and some offer drink pairings. [Axios]
Question: Is it a bit early in the year to anoint the best restaurant of 2025? Washingtonian doesn’t think so. Albi tops this year’s list of 100 best restaurants. [Washingtonian]
By City Paper staff (tips? editor@washingtoncitypaper.com)
Rockville-based rapper Lil Xelly was murdered in the early hours of Jan. 17. The body of the 26-year-old, also known as Marcell Jordan Hebron, was found in a BMW with bullet holes marking the car’s exterior. The homicide was linked to another murder, that of 27-year-old Leilani Marroquin. Kaloyan Dimov Stoev, 25, has been charged with first-degree murder and handgun-related offenses. [MoCo Show]
Recapping D.C.’s fetish affairs at Mid-Atlantic Leather Weekend. [Metro Weekly]
Art Enables, Theatre Washington, Dance Place, DC Jazz Festival, and Mosaic Theater Company are among the many D.C.-based arts organizations to receive funding this year from the National Endowment for the Arts. [NEA]
By Sarah Marloff (tips? smarloff@washingtoncitypaper.com)
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