On the afternoon of September 22, 2022, 57-year-old landscaper Bacilio Villatoro was killed while working in the 3000 block of Adams Street NE in the Gateway neighborhood of Northeast Washington, D.C. Villatoro and coworkers confronted a man they saw tampering with their tree-trimming truck; a physical struggle followed. The man retreated to his vehicle, retrieved a handgun, and opened fire as the workers ran. Villatoro was struck in the back and collapsed in a nearby alley; emergency personnel pronounced him dead at the scene. The shooter fled in a vehicle described as a black Chevrolet Impala.

Metropolitan Police identified 21-year-old Jamari Payne from surveillance footage and a tip, and a D.C. Superior Court arrest warrant was issued. Payne was located by the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and arrested on December 23, 2022. He was charged with second-degree murder while armed. Villatoro’s family described him as a quiet, hardworking man who came to the United States from El Salvador in the 1980s and is survived by his wife and children. Did anyone see the truck or that black Chevrolet Impala in the Gateway area that afternoon?