Killings In D.C. Up After Long Dip

Outreach worker Trayon White, left, with James Wood, 16, whom he mentors, knew five of last year's slaying victims. "You get numb to it," White says. (By Nikki Kahn -- The Washington Post)
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Across the city, Cmdr. Joel Maupin, who heads the 7th District, said the gunfire is not concentrated in specific spots. "People are shooting at targets, stop signs -- everything. They're just shooting," he said.

Police have zeroed in on certain areas, including the neighborhood around Condon Terrace, near the Prince George's border, and are working with social service agencies, the Health Department and schools. At least four officers are on duty in the Condon Terrace area at any time.

"Crime has started to go down in that area," Maupin said. "But we've noticed it's been pushed out to surrounding areas."

White, meanwhile, is trying to help young people get jobs and stay in school. He and others in the police-clergy partnership have focused on the Woodland Terrace neighborhood, in Southeast.

He tries to get to the heart of what's driving the crime, whether it's groups of youths fighting one another, mental health issues or employment. He gives youths rides to school, takes them to the movies and organizes get-togethers with groups from other neighborhoods to try to foster friendships.

"People shoot at each other because they are from different neighborhoods, because they have a different address," said White, a graduate of Ballou Senior High School who has a degree in business administration. "People have guns; that's just the way it is. You live in a hostile environment."

Victims know that all too well.

Damon Sams, 19, was headed to work as a neighborhood outreach worker when three young people stopped him in September in the 1900 block of Savannah Terrace SE. He was shot three times and said he was a victim of retaliation.

"I didn't trip, because I did something to them and I knew it would come back," said Sams, who joined the outreach group Peaceoholics recently and said he has turned his life around. "I had to roll with the punches. Life goes on."

LaWanda Yeager was one of three people, including a 10-year-old girl, shot Memorial Day during an outdoor go-go music gathering at the Temple Courts housing complex at North Capitol and L streets NW. All survived.

Her 21-year-old son, Michael, was fatally shot Dec. 3 in front of his home on First Place NW. It was the second time in a year he had been shot, and his mother believes that he was targeted because he testified at a murder trial more than a year ago.

"He is my heart, a mother's pride and joy," Yeager said. "My family will be forever lost without him."

Staff researcher Madonna Lebling and staff reporter Martin Weil contributed to this report.