Nathaniel E. Holmes, known as Fatts, was an 18-year-old Black male shot and killed in Northeast Washington, D.C. on November 12, 1999. While driving in the 1600 block of Brentwood Road NE, his car was pursued by people in two separate vehicles who opened fire. Holmes was hit at least once but kept driving until he crashed into a parked car in the 1000 block of New York Avenue NE. He exited his vehicle, collapsed, and was taken to D.C. General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead in the early morning hours.

Holmes was a guard on Spingarn High School’s basketball team and remembered by coaches and teammates as the team’s emotional leader and hardest worker. At the time of his death he had been making positive changes in his life, including participation in a juvenile drug program; his team dedicated their 2000 season to his memory. The Metropolitan Police Department’s Homicide and Sexual Offenses Branch lists the killing as unsolved; no arrests or publicly identified suspects have been announced and a reward of up to $25,000 is offered for information leading to an arrest and conviction.

Anyone with information about Nathaniel Holmes’s death is urged to come forward.