A 19-year-old Washington, D.C. man was sentenced to probation on Friday after firing more than 20 rounds into a Northwest neighborhood in May, wounding a boy who was playing basketball at a recreation center, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.
Darius Drew, 19, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and a firearm offense in connection with the shooting. Prosecutors had asked for a five-year prison sentence, pointing to what they described as Drew’s “indiscriminate conduct” in firing the rounds into a populated area from two separate locations.
Instead, Drew was sentenced under the District’s Youth Rehabilitation Act, a law that allows younger offenders to receive more lenient treatment at sentencing. Prosecutors had objected to sentencing him under that law.
According to court evidence, the shooting unfolded on May 11, 2026, when Drew was seen riding a Lime bike into an alley in the 700 block of Taylor Street, Northwest. Shortly afterward, the city’s ShotSpotter gunfire-detection system alerted police to the sound of 10 gunshots in the area.
Surveillance footage showed Drew firing a gun at a parked car in the alley. Seconds later, court documents show, he fired again toward a home in the 4100 block of 9th Street, Northwest. One of those shots struck a boy who was playing basketball at a nearby recreation center.
The case has drawn attention from gun-rights advocates and critics of D.C.’s juvenile sentencing policies, who argue that the outcome illustrates a disconnect between the violence of the offense and the consequences handed down by the court. The U.S. Attorney’s Office had sought a substantially harsher sentence, citing the number of rounds fired and the risk posed to bystanders, but the court’s decision to proceed under the Youth Rehabilitation Act resulted in probation rather than incarceration.
