A D.C. teen found dead in Prince George’s County late Friday was a ward of the District’s Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services, The Washington Times has learned.
Michael Chamberlin, 17, of the 3500 block of Stanton Road in Southeast, was found dead in the 3300 block of 27th Avenue in Temple Hills at 10:06 p.m. Friday.
Chamberlin was a ward of the city’s juvenile-justice system, according to agency sources who talked with The Times on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
The Times in a series of stories last year detailed escalating levels of violence among the roughly 1,100 youths in the agency’s care in large part because of poor placement decisions, facilities for holding youths that are inadequate to the agency’s needs and a lack of promised services to juveniles returned to their communities.
The killing Friday comes amid a difficult week for the agency, including two incidents of youths escaping custody and two city wards being injured Thursday in a daylight shooting near the U Street corridor.
Devon Narce, 20, was a ward of the city at the time he was shot in the ankle Thursday in the 1400 block of V Street Northwest. He was supposed to be on GPS monitoring, but had failed to comply, agency sources said.
Marquette Hunter, 19, who was also shot in the ankle, was a former DYRS ward whose case closed last year, according to agency sources.
The suspect in the shooting was described as a black male with a dark complexion, in his early 20s, wearing a black hat and blue pants.
Police are still searching for an 18-year-old who escaped from a secure facility Sunday in Laurel after beating a corrections officer and taking his keys.
D.C. officials say the teen used a ladder to hop a fence at the New Beginnings Youth Development Center and got away in the officer’s car. He ditched the car in the Barry Farm area of Southeast.
Police identified the youth as Treyvon Cortez Carey, 18. He previously had been identified by The Times as Travon Curry.
Carey’s disappearance preceded an escape Wednesday by four D.C. youths from the Palmetto Summerville Behavioral Health Center, a secure juvenile facility in South Carolina. Three of the four youths were recaptured Thursday morning. A fourth youth, 19-year-old Delonte Parker, is still on the loose.
Parker was charged in 2006 with assault with intent to kill, according to sources close to the investigation. It is unclear whether he was convicted of the charge. D.C. Superior Court records indicate he was also arrested in 2008 for fleeing a police officer in the area of 17th and Euclid streets in Northwest.
He was later found guilty on a charge of tampering with a monitoring device.
• Jeffrey Anderson can be reached at jmanderson@washingtontimes.com.
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