DISTRICT BRIEFING

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

HANDGUN LAW

Plaintiff's Revolver Registration Approved

A 66-year-old security guard whose lawsuit overturned the District's handgun ban is now officially authorized to keep a revolver in his Capitol Hill home.

Dick A. Heller was given his handgun registration certificate at D.C. police headquarters yesterday.

He applied for it last month, a few weeks after the June 26 landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling favoring gun-ownership rights, and he had been waiting for police to complete a background check.

Heller recently sued the city again, saying the registration rules adopted by the D.C. government after the ban was overturned are too cumbersome and violate the spirit and letter of the court's decision.

-- Paul Duggan

CRIME

Maryland Teen Is Found Fatally Shot

A 17-year-old Prince George's County girl was shot to death early yesterday in Southeast Washington, D.C. police said.

Officers responding to a report of gunfire shortly after 1:30 a.m. found the girl with a bullet wound in the 3600 block of 22nd Street, police said.

She was later pronounced dead at a hospital. Police identified her as Shanee Daugherty of the 9500 block of Hobart Street in Springdale.

-- Paul Duggan

Teenager Shot in Calf in SE

A female teenager was shot in the leg late Sunday in the 4300 block of Benning Road SE, D.C. police said.

They said the woman was found by police and ambulance personnel about 11 p.m. with a gunshot wound to her left calf.

She had reportedly been walking home when a shot was fired from a car, police said. The vehicle was described as a black, four-door Acura.

They said the teenager was taken to Children's National Medical Center for treatment. The wound was not considered life-threatening, they said.

The victim's name was being withheld because she is considered a witness, police said.

Police said they are investigating.

-- Elissa Silverman

EDUCATION

Officials Cut Ribbon on Phelps School

D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) led a large contingent of officials in cutting the ribbon yesterday for the new $63 million Phelps Architecture, Construction and Engineering High School.

City officials hailed the reborn Phelps, shuttered by budget cuts five years ago, as the first of its kind among public high schools, offering programs for both college-bound students and those interested in trades for after graduation.

"People think it's one or the other," said D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee. "What we're going to prove here at Phelps is that you can have both."

Council member Kwame R. Brown (D-At Large), a former Phelps student and a key figure in securing funding for the new school, said the reopening fills a significant hole in the D.C. system.

"Today we are undoing a wrong," Brown said.

-- Bill Turque