Three Men Killed in Separate Shootings in One Afternoon

Three people were killed yesterday in separate shootings in the District, shot on the streets in the middle of the afternoon during an unusually violent two-hour stretch.

Police were called to the 5700 block of Nannie Helen Burroughs Avenue NE about 3 p.m. They found an unconscious man with multiple gunshot wounds in the driveway of a vacant house, said Cmdr. Robert Contee of the 6th Police District. The man, whom they had not identified last night, was taken to a hospital and died a short time later.

The next victim was found about 4:30 p.m., when police were called to a liquor store parking lot in the 3500 block of Wheeler Road SE. The 35-year-old man, whose identity was not released, was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead, said Cmdr. Andy Solberg. Police were investigating the possibility that robbery was a motive and said a beige sport-utility vehicle might have been involved.

The third shooting took place about 5 p.m. in the 3200 block of 22nd Street SE. Investigators think the victim, David Tucker, 37, of the unit block of Capitol Heights Boulevard in District Heights, was shot in the street and wandered into a barbershop doorway, where he collapsed, Solberg said.

The incidents appeared to be unrelated, Solberg said. No arrests had been made last night.

D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier went to the Wheeler Road crime scene last night to ask for the public's help in solving the cases and to highlight the department's revamped Crime Solvers program, which offers as much as $1,000 for anonymous tips that lead to arrests.

"All three of these incidents happened in the middle of the day, and I know there are witnesses out there," Lanier said in a telephone interview. "I want them to be ringing my phone line. . . . It's not too late to stop this violence."

Officials later reported that a woman in her 40s was shot in the leg near a convenience store in the 4400 block of South Capitol and Elmira streets in Southwest Washington about 8:30 p.m. The shooting occurred during a robbery attempt by a masked gunman described as being a slender man about 5-foot-3.

Two other people were killed this week in the city, including a 17-year-old Woodrow Wilson High School senior.