School Bus Aide Slain At Church

A 24-year-old school bus aide was fatally shot yesterday as he tried to run from an assailant into a church where he worked, police said.

Investigators think the Southeast Washington man, whose name was not immediately released, was attacked as he walked about 4 p.m. to his job at a charter school housed in Jones Memorial United Methodist Church. Shortly before the shooting, he got off a Metrobus on Benning Road SE, police said.

The gunman, whose age police estimated at 16 to 18, chased the man to the front steps of the church in the 4600 block of G Street SE and shot him six times, said Capt. C.V. Morris of the violent crimes branch, citing witness accounts.

Cmdr. Robin Hoey of the 6th Police District said that at the time of the shooting, students at Septima Clark Public Charter School were boarding a bus behind the church. The all-boys school has children in preschool to eighth grade.

The gunman fled on foot, police said. The victim was transported to Washington Hospital Center, where he was pronounced dead three hours later.

Hoey said police did not know whether the men knew each other. The motive for the shooting was not clear, police said.