Washington, D.C., police recorded the 100th homicide of 2025 in the nation’s capital Monday evening, just hours after President Donald Trump announced that the federal government would take control of law enforcement to crack down on violent crime in D.C.
Tymark Wells, 33, was shot multiple times in D.C.’s Logan Circle neighborhood just before 7:00 p.m., Fox 5 reported. The victim was taken to the hospital after police arrived on the scene and was later pronounced dead. Police are searching for a man wearing a black shirt and carrying a rifle, according to NBC 4 Washington.
Logan Circle is just one mile from the White House and is described as one of D.C.’s more popular neighborhoods, attracting young crowds to its restaurants and bars. After the shooting, the Secret Service closed the Ellipse park near the White House, along with the north and south fence lines around the White House.
The D.C. Police Union, which backed Trump’s decision to federalize the police department, said in a statement, “Last night, DC suffered the grave milestone of its 100th homicide for 2025. Let’s hope this federal intervention leads to real change to the laws in DC that allow this to happen year after year.”
The fatal shooting is yet another example of the violent crime plaguing the nation’s capital that President Trump has vowed to root out. The homicide rate in D.C. in 2024 reached 27.3 per 100,000 residents, giving the U.S. capital the fourth-highest homicide rate of any city in the country. So far in 2025, D.C. authorities have also reported over 530 assaults with a dangerous weapon, nearly 900 robberies, and nearly 3,000 motor vehicle thefts. While the city has reported lower violent crime levels since record highs from 2020 to 2023, violent crime remains much higher in D.C. than it did 10-15 years ago.
D.C.’s crime data has also been questioned after a Metropolitan Police Department commander was suspended and placed under investigation for allegedly changing crime statistics. That investigation was announced shortly after the commander filed an equal employment opportunity complaint against an assistant chief, and after the police union accused the Metropolitan Police Department of falsifying crime stats to make it appear as if the city had seen a drop in violent crime, NBC 4 Washington reported.
Still, Democratic city leaders argue that they are doing their job to address violent crime in D.C. On Monday, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said that Trump’s “view of D.C. is shaped by his COVID-era experience during his first term,” when the city was experiencing a record-breaking crime wave.
“And it is true that those were challenging times related to some issues. It is also true that we experienced a crime spike post-COVID, but we worked quickly to put laws in place and tactics that got violent offenders off our streets and gave our police officers more tools,” Bowser said, adding, “We have been able to reverse that 2023 crime spike.”
Neither Trump nor the D.C. Police Union, which represents over 3,000 officers with the Metropolitan Police Department, agrees that Democratic leaders are properly enforcing the law and protecting Americans.
The D.C. Police Union said in a statement on Monday that it “acknowledges and supports the President’s announcement this morning to assume temporary control of the MPD in response to the escalating crime crisis in Washington, DC.”
“The Union agrees that crime is spiraling out of control, and immediate action is necessary to restore public safety,” the police union added.