On the afternoon of November 21, 2025, in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, 22-year-old Babacar Mbengue, a Black African American male, was shot during an argument with a relative near the intersection of Richmond Avenue and Fenton Street and later died at a local hospital. Responding to reports of a shooting around 2:07 p.m., Montgomery County 3rd District officers and Fire Rescue personnel arrived on Richmond Avenue and found Mbengue lying in the street with a gunshot wound to the chest.
He was immediately transported to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.
Investigators determined that the confrontation began inside a red Tesla, where Mbengue and his relative were engaged in an argument that escalated. Both exited the vehicle and continued their dispute in the street, where the altercation became physical. During this fight, the relative allegedly produced a firearm and shot Mbengue once in the chest before fleeing the scene in the same red Tesla, leaving bystanders to call 911 as the victim collapsed on the roadway.
Detectives with the Montgomery County Department of Police – Major Crimes Division, Homicide Section quickly identified the suspect as 20-year-old Fallou Galass Fall of Laurel, Maryland, who is described by police as a relative of the victim. Within a few hours of the shooting, officers located Fall in Laurel, stopping him as he was driving away from his apartment shortly after 6 p.m. He was taken into custody without reported incident and transported to the Montgomery County Central Processing Unit, where he was formally charged with first-degree murder in connection with Mbengue’s death. As of the latest public updates, Fall is being held while awaiting a bond hearing, and no additional suspects have been publicly identified; authorities have presented the case as a dispute between the two relatives that turned deadly.
News coverage from both local outlets in the Washington, D.C.–Maryland area and diaspora-focused media in Senegal has emphasized the sudden and personal nature of the killing, noting that the case involved relatives of Senegalese origin and has deeply shaken members of the Senegalese community in and around Silver Spring. Vigils and online memorials have highlighted that Mbengue’s life was lost to gun violence in a matter of moments during what began as a private dispute inside a car and ended in a fatal shooting on a public street.
