In the early morning hours of February 24, 2013, a night of partying in College Park, Maryland, took a fatal turn for 20-year-old David Esequel Avelar. He was attending a party at a hotel on Baltimore Avenue when a confrontation erupted in the parking lot. A fight broke out between the group Avelar was with and another group that had been at a separate party in the same hotel.
In the midst of the altercation, a gunshot rang out, and Avelar was struck.
Police responded to a report of the shooting in the 9100 block of Baltimore Avenue at approximately 4:00 a.m. Upon arrival, they discovered Avelar suffering from a gunshot wound. He was rushed to a local hospital, but his injuries proved to be too severe, and he was pronounced dead. Investigators with the Prince George's County Police Department quickly determined that the homicide appeared to be gang-related.
The investigation led detectives to identify a suspect in the deadly shooting. On March 1, 2013, authorities arrested 20-year-old Edwin Morales of Southeast Washington. Morales was taken into custody in Northwest Washington, D.C., and was subsequently charged with first and second-degree murder, along with other related charges, in connection with Avelar's death. Following his arrest, he was held in Washington, D.C., awaiting extradition to Prince George's County to face the charges against him.
