Travis Barksdale, 25, was shot and killed shortly after midnight on Thursday, August 23, 2018, in the 600 block of Evarts Street NE, near his home in the Edgewood neighborhood of Washington, D.C. He was rushed to a hospital and pronounced dead; his death was the city’s 100th homicide that year. Barksdale worked at Madame Tussauds crafting wax hands and was a father to a young daughter. Family described him as family-oriented and shocked by the killing.

Police tied the shooting to an ongoing violent dispute between people from the Edgewood and Saratoga Avenue areas. Witnesses said Barksdale was targeted because of his association with Edgewood, though investigators stated he was not a member of the Edgewood Terrace Crew. Court documents say he had armed himself for self-defense amid the rivalry. Thirty-two shell casings were recovered at the scene.

In November 2018, 19-year-old Mark Anthony Fletcher III was charged with second-degree murder while armed; prosecutors say he’d been wounded in a June shootout with Barksdale and had confronted him days before the death in an alleged attempt to extort money or marijuana. Fletcher was already jailed on an unrelated gun charge when arrested in the homicide.