Jameil A. Congo, a 23-year-old Black man from Wilmington, Delaware, was caught in a deadly burst of gunfire on the morning of February 21, 2017. At approximately 10:54 a.m., Wilmington police responded to reports of shots fired near 22nd and North Market streets. Officers arriving in the 2200 block of North Market Street found Congo and Ainsley Cumberbatch Jr. suffering from gunshot wounds. Cumberbatch had been shot in the head and was pronounced dead at the scene.
Congo had wounds to his right arm and chest. New Castle County paramedics treated him before rushing him to Christiana Hospital in critical condition, but he later died from his injuries. The daylight double homicide forced authorities to close both directions of North Market Street for several hours while detectives examined the scene and searched for evidence.
As the investigation continued, Wilmington police identified Thomas Hollingsworth of Wilmington as the suspected gunman. Hollingsworth was located in Pennsylvania and taken into custody on March 8, 2017, through a joint effort involving the First State Fugitive Task Force, the United States Marshals Service and the Eastern Pennsylvania Violent Crimes Task Force. By the time murder charges were announced, he was being held at the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution on unrelated charges. A New Castle County grand jury indicted Hollingsworth on two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and two counts of possession of a firearm by a person prohibited, connecting him to the deaths of Congo and Cumberbatch.
The prosecution was ultimately resolved without a trial. In October 2018, Hollingsworth pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder and one count of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. The plea covered both killings and left the final punishment to the Superior Court. On March 15, 2019, the court imposed an aggregate sentence of 68 years at Level V incarceration, suspending the sentence after 48 years for probation. Hollingsworth did not appeal the conviction or sentence, although court records indicate that several later requests to modify his sentence were denied. The arrest, guilty pleas and lengthy prison term brought a legal resolution to the double homicide that had begun with gunfire on a busy Wilmington street and ended with two families mourning lives lost on the same February morning.
