In the late hours of a Monday night in Washington, D.C., a sequence of events unfolded that would tragically end the life of 26-year-old Zekariya Elmi of Alexandria, Virginia. On April 25, 2022, at approximately 11:35 p.m., police responded to reports of a traffic accident and a shooting in the 5000 block of South Dakota Avenue, Northeast. Upon arrival in the Michigan Park neighborhood, officers discovered Elmi inside a vehicle, suffering from a gunshot wound.
He had been shot in the chest and, in the aftermath, his car sped away before crashing. Emergency services transported him to a local hospital, but his injuries proved fatal, and he was pronounced dead.
The investigation into the male victim's death revealed that he was working as a delivery driver for a marijuana dispensary called Jamaican House. Authorities believe he was lured to the location under the pretense of a delivery. This theory gained traction as investigators linked his murder to a similar case from the previous year. In July 2021, another marijuana delivery driver, Muntsier Sharfi, was also shot and killed in what appeared to be a robbery.
A significant breakthrough in the case came in January 2023 when police in Prince George's County arrested a man during a traffic stop and found a handgun in his vehicle. Ballistics testing connected this firearm to the murder of Sharfi, which in turn helped detectives link the suspect to Elmi's case. Investigators discovered that the suspect had used a TextNow account with the username “cordefitzhugh44” to communicate with his victims.
On July 10, 2023, the Capital Area Regional Fugitive Task Force arrested 22-year-old Corde Fitzhugh-Clingman of Hyattsville, Maryland. He was charged with two counts of first-degree murder while armed in connection with the deaths of both Zekariya Elmi and Muntsier Sharfi. Further investigation led to a grand jury indictment, and Fitzhugh-Clingman faced multiple charges, including felony murder with aggravating circumstances, attempted armed robbery, and various firearms offenses. Court proceedings revealed that the suspect had allegedly used stolen photo IDs to place the delivery orders, luring both men to their deaths in what prosecutors described as robberies or attempted robberies where ultimately nothing was taken from the victims.
