A Brooklyn man was charged with attempted murder for a bloody shooting at a Howard Beach motel in September, according to Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz.
Rawle Washington, 27, of Scholes Street in South Williamsburg, was arraigned Wednesday afternoon, Jan. 19 before Queens Criminal Court Judge Michael Gaffey on a seven-count complaint charging him with attempted murder, assault and other crimes for injuring a man he allegedly shot at the Surfside Motel on Cross Bay Boulevard.
According to the charges, shortly after 10 a.m. on Sept. 18, police from the 106th Precinct in Ozone Park responded to the motel where a 29-year-old man had been shot. The victim was lying on the ground in front of the motel entrance bleeding profusely from a gunshot wound to the leg. The man had also been shot once in the buttocks and was taken by EMS to Jamaica Hospital for treatment.
According to the complaint, Washington was seen on video surveillance in a baseball cap, light-colored shirt and dark pants in the motel lobby just after 5 a.m. Video footage later that morning, around 10 a.m., showed Washington allegedly running after the victim and pointing a gun in the man’s direction and firing several times.
Immediately after the shots rang out, Washington allegedly turned and ran in the opposite direction toward the rear of the motel. Further video evidence showed Washington allegedly tossing the gun into the Shellbank Basin, directly behind the motel. Police recovered the weapon, as well as a light-colored shirt and the baseball cap near the crime scene.
The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner swabbed both the baseball cap and the shirt and recovered DNA from those items. A DNA profile of a male donor was created and a short time later law enforcement was notified that a match had been found — allegedly Washington.
The defendant was taken into custody on Jan. 18, after a lengthy investigation into his whereabouts.
“As alleged, the defendant thought he made a clean getaway by tossing the gun in a nearby waterway and abandoning his hat and shirt as he fled – but he could not get away from his DNA,” Katz said. “Genetic testing on this evidence connects the defendant to this brutal crime.”
Washington faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted.
