A day after someone shot five children, killing a 3-year-old girl, neighbors in a Dumfries still were trying to process what happened.
The shooting inside a home in the 17900 block of Milroy Dr. happened around 10:50 a.m. on Jan. 4. Neighbors said they heard 10 to 12 gunshots, and then a girl screaming in the parking lot.
Shahrooz Khan, who has lived in the neighborhood since 2009, said he was on a work call when the shooting happened. He immediately ran upstairs to see what was going on.
“We just thought that she was just hiding for cover, as all of us were, kind of confused,” Khan said. “But as soon as she said, ‘Help me. I don’t want to die,’ we all ran up there.”
Khan described the 17-year-old’s injuries as “gruesome.” He ran into the parking lot to help her, along with other neighbors.
“It was pretty bad. Honestly, I was shaking. Should I hold her? Should I do this?” he explained.
Police were on the scene within minutes. Khan said after officers went inside, and it became clear that the situation was much worse than it looked from the outside.
In the townhome basement, officers found four more shooting victims between the ages of three and 16. The 3-year-old, a girl, died there.
Khan said, “It’s… It’s kind of just crazy. You never thought or ever imagine in your lifetime something like this will ever happen.”
Another child, a 13-year-old boy, who was in the home when the shooting happened, was unharmed. Police said four of the shooting victims are related.
The Prince William County Police Department arrested 20-year-old Kenyatta Lee Oglesby for the shooting Wednesday afternoon. Police said Oglesby was in a relationship with the 17-year-old girl and had been staying at the townhome. He’s charged with Murder, Aggravated Malicious Wounding (4 counts), and Use of a Firearm in the Commission of a Felony (5 counts). Oglesby was being held without bond.
Oglesby has a criminal past and was wanted by authorities for a separate incident when he allegedly pulled the trigger.
In October of 2021, Oglesby was arrested by officers with the Metropolitan Police Department and charged with unlawful possession of a firearm. According to an affidavit, an officer said the then-18-year-old had a “fully functional and operational” ghost gun.
Oglesby was offered, and accepted, a plea deal in May 2022. He plead guilty to the crime, but records show he never showed up for an October hearing, prompting a bench warrant to be filed.
In fact, he was on D.C.’s Active Warrant List when this week’s shooting happened.
A stray bullet went through a neighbor’s window and through her home. The woman, who did not want to be identified, said she recently moved to the neighborhood, and the incident greatly concerns her.
Khan is concerned, too. He said the community recently started a neighborhood watch, but he is not convinced it will lead to change.
