District of Columbia
Fourth man charged in 2016 D.C. trans murder sentenced to seven years
But with credit for time served, Cyheme Hall could be free in two years
A D.C. Superior Court judge on May 10 handed down a sentence of seven years in prison for the last of four men originally charged with first degree murder while armed in the July 4, 2016, shooting death of transgender woman Deeniquia “Dee Dee” Dodds on a street in Northeast Washington.
Judge Milton C. Lee delivered his sentence on Tuesday for D.C. resident Cyheme Hall, 26, just under three weeks after he issued the same seven-year sentence to Hall’s brother, Shareem Hall, 28, who, along with two other D.C. men, were initially charged with first degree murder while armed in connection with the Dodds case.
Police and prosecutors said Dodds was one of several transgender women that the Hall brothers and co-defendants Jalonta Little, 31, and Monte Johnson, 26, targeted for armed robberies in the early morning hours of July 4, 2016. Court charging documents say Johnson allegedly fatally shot Dodds in the neck after she fought back during the robbery attempt.
Lee acknowledged at the Tuesday, May 10 sentencing hearing that Cyheme Hall and his brother agreed to an offer in 2019 to cooperate with police and prosecutors following their arrests in exchange for being allowed to plead guilty to a second-degree murder charge. The two brothers testified as government witnesses at Little and Johnson’s trial in 2019 on the first degree murder charge and other charges, including armed robbery.
The judge noted that because of that cooperation, prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for D.C. issued a recommendation that the two brothers be sentenced to seven years in the Dodds case, a sentence that Lee pointed out is far lower than the potential sentence for a second-degree murder conviction. Under D.C. law, a second-degree murder conviction has a maximum sentence of life in prison.
As part of the plea offer that Cyheme Hall accepted in 2019, he also pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit a crime of violence. Lee on May 10 sentenced him to seven years for that charge in addition to the seven years for the second degree murder charge. However, Lee ordered that the two sentences be served concurrently for a total of seven years.
Under standard sentencing practices, Lee gave Cyheme Hall and his brother credit for the just over five years the two have already served in jail since the time of their arrest. That means Cyheme Hall could be released in less than two years, after which he must serve five years of supervised probation after being released as part of the sentence handed down by Lee.
Cyheme Hall’s attorney, Jonathan Zucker, told Lee at the sentencing hearing that his client faces a possible sentence of nine years for a parole violation charge in connection with an unrelated burglary case in Prince George’s County, Maryland. Zucker said Hall was given a nine-year suspended sentence in the burglary case on the condition that he would not become involved in criminal activity during the time of his parole.
Lee declined a request by Zucker that Lee consider making a recommendation to the judge overseeing Hall’s parole violation case in Prince George’s County that the nine years be served concurrently with the seven years for the D.C. case.
Zucker said this means that it will be up to a Maryland judge to decide whether Cyheme Hall should serve up to nine years or less time in the Maryland case upon his release in the Dodds case.
The 2019 trial for Little and Johnson, meanwhile, ended with Judge Lee declaring a mistrial after the jury was unable to reach a verdict. Before the case went before the jury, prosecutors dropped their initial designation of the murder as a hate crime after Lee ruled in favor of a defense motion that there was insufficient evidence to prove a hate crime. Prosecutors said they filed the hate crime charge because they believe the men targeted Dodds because she was transgender.
After initially saying they planned to request another trial on the murder charge, prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office offered Little and Johnson a plea bargain deal, which they accepted, in which they pled guilty to a single count of voluntary manslaughter with the murder charge dropped.
The offer included a promise by prosecutors to ask for a sentence of eight years for the two men. Lee agreed to that request when he sentenced Little and Johnson to eight years last December.
Some LGBTQ activists have expressed concern that prosecutors should have pushed for a second trial for Johnson and Little. Activists have said reducing the charge from first degree murder to manslaughter sends a message that targeting members of the LGBTQ community for crimes of violence, especially trans women of color, can result in a lenient sentence of little more than a slapping of the wrist.
Attorneys familiar with criminal cases like this have said prosecutors sometimes offer a plea deal after determining that going to trial a second time could result in a not-guilty verdict based on the circumstances of the case.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Sharon Donovan, the lead prosecutor in the Dodds murder case, discussed prosecutors’ rationale for agreeing to a sentence of eight years for Little and Johnson during their sentencing hearing last December in response to a question from Lee asking whether the sentence was too lenient.
“Your honor, we believe that this takes into consideration the first trial and the evidentiary difficulties that were highlighted during the first trial and other incidents that occurred during the first trial,” Donovan told Lee. She added that the impact of a sentence on the victim’s family and the community was also considered. “And we believe that taking all of that into consideration, that it is an appropriate sentence,” she said.
At his sentencing hearing on May 10, Cyheme Hall offered his apologies to the family of the victim and said he was deeply sorry for his role in the incident that took the life of Dodds.
In a written statement submitted to the court, Hall expressed his “deepest remorse” for his actions. “I know that no matter what I say or do, I cannot change what has happened but going forward I vow to dedicate the rest of my life righting my wrong,” he wrote. “I feel like I owe this to the victim as well as the family and my community.”
Lee thanked Hall for his statement but said he could not lower the sentence to six years, as requested by Hall’s attorney, nor could he ask the Maryland judge to consider a lower sentence for the parole violation.
“You did not have the strength to say no to this crime,” Lee told Hall. “You could have extricated yourself from this, but you didn’t. There are some things you can’t get out of,” Lee said. “It was shameful what you did.”
District of Columbia
U.S. Attorney’s Office drops hate crime charge in anti-gay assault
Case remains under investigation and ‘further charges’ could come
D.C. police announced on Feb. 9 that they had arrested two days earlier on Feb. 7 a Germantown, Md., man on a charge of simple assault with a hate crime designation after the man allegedly assaulted a gay man at 14th and Q Streets, N.W., while using “homophobic slurs.”
But D.C. Superior Court records show that prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for D.C., which prosecutes D.C. violent crime cases, charged the arrested man only with simple assault without a hate crime designation.
In response to a request by the Washington Blade for the reason why the hate crime designation was dropped, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office provided this response: “We continue to investigate this matter and make no mistake: should the evidence call for further charges, we will not hesitate to charge them.”
In a statement announcing the arrest in this case, D.C. police stated, “On Saturday, February 7, 2026, at approximately 7:45 p.m. the victim and suspect were in the 1500 block of 14th Street, Northwest. The suspect requested a ‘high five’ from the victim. The victim declined and continued walking,” the statement says.
“The suspect assaulted the victim and used homophobic slurs,” the police statement continues. “The suspect was apprehended by responding officers.”
It adds that 26-year-old Dean Edmundson of Germantown, Md. “was arrested and charged with Simple Assault (Hate/Bias).” The statement also adds, “A designation as a hate crime by MPD does not mean that prosecutors will prosecute it as a hate crime.”
Under D.C.’s Bias Related Crime Act of 1989, penalties for crimes motivated by prejudice against individuals based on race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, and homelessness can be enhanced by a court upon conviction by one and a half times greater than the penalty of the underlying crime.
Prosecutors in the past both in D.C. and other states have said they sometimes decide not to include a hate crime designation in assault cases if they don’t think the evidence is sufficient to obtain a conviction by a jury. In some instances, prosecutors have said they were concerned that a skeptical jury might decide to find a defendant not guilty of the underlying assault charge if they did not believe a motive of hate was involved.
A more detailed arrest affidavit filed by D.C. police in Superior Court appears to support the charge of a hate crime designation.
“The victim stated that they refused to High-Five Defendant Edmondson, which, upon that happening, Defendant Edmondson started walking behind both the victim and witness, calling the victim, “bald, ugly, and gay,” the arrest affidavit states.
“The victim stated that upon being called that, Defendant Edmundson pushed the victim with both hands, shoving them, causing the victim to feel the force of the push,” the affidavit continues. “The victim stated that they felt offended and that they were also gay,” it says.
District of Columbia
Capital Pride wins anti-stalking order against local activist
Darren Pasha claims action is linked to his criticism of Pride organizers
A D.C. Superior Court judge on Feb. 6 partially approved an anti-stalking order against a local LGBTQ activist requested last October by the Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C.-based LGBTQ group that organizes the city’s annual Pride events.
The ruling by Judge Robert D. Okun requires former Capital Pride volunteer Darren Pasha to stay at least 100 feet away from Capital Pride’s staff, board members, and volunteers until the time of a follow up court hearing he scheduled for April 17.
In his ruling at the Feb. 6 hearing, which was virtual rather than held in-person at the courthouse, Okun said he had changed the distance that Capital Pride had requested for the stay-away, anti-stalking order from 200 yards to 100 feet. The court records show that the judge also denied a motion filed earlier by Pasha, who did not attend the hearing, to “quash” the Capital Pride civil case against him.
Pasha told the Washington Blade he suffered an injury and damaged his mobile phone by falling off his scooter on the city’s snow-covered streets that prevented him from calling in to join the Feb. 6 court hearing.
In his own court filings without retaining an attorney, Pasha has strongly denied the stalking related allegations against him by Capital Pride, saying “no credible or admissible evidence has been provided” to show he engaged in any wrongdoing.
The Capital Pride complaint initially filed in court on Oct. 27, 2025, includes an 18-page legal brief outlining its allegations against Pasha and an additional 167-page addendum of “supporting exhibits” that includes multiple statements by witnesses whose names are blacked out.
“Over the past year, Defendant Darren Pasha (“DSP”) has engaged in a sustained, and escalating course of conduct directed at CPA, including repeated and unwanted contact, harassment, intimidation, threats, manipulation, and coercive behavior targeting CPA staff, board members, volunteers, and affiliates,” the Capital Pride complaint states.
In his initial 16-page response to the complaint, Pasha says the Capital Pride complaint appears to be a form of retaliation against him for a dispute he has had with the organization and its then president, Ashley Smith, last year.
“It is evident that the document is replete with false, misleading, and unsubstantiated assertions,” he said of the complaint.
Smith, who has since resigned from his role as board president, did not respond to a request by the Blade for comment at the time the Capital Pride court complaint was filed against Pasha.
Capital Pride Executive Director Ryan Bos and the attorney representing the group in its legal action against Pasha, Nick Harrison, did not immediately respond to a Blade request for comment on the judge’s Feb. 6 ruling.
District of Columbia
D.C. pays $500,000 to settle lawsuit brought by gay Corrections Dept. employee
Alleged years of verbal harassment, slurs, intimidation
The D.C. government on Feb. 5 agreed to pay $500,000 to a gay D.C. Department of Corrections officer as a settlement to a lawsuit the officer filed in 2021 alleging he was subjected to years of discrimination at his job because of his sexual orientation, according to a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union of D.C.
The statement says the lawsuit, filed on behalf of Sgt. Deon Jones by the ACLU of D.C. and the law firm WilmerHale, alleged that the Department of Corrections, including supervisors and co-workers, “subjected Sgt. Jones to discrimination, retaliation, and a hostile work environment because of his identity as a gay man, in violation of the D.C. Human Rights Act.”
Daniel Gleick, a spokesperson for D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, said the mayor’s office would have no comment on the lawsuit settlement. A spokesperson for the Office of the D.C. Attorney General, which represents the city against lawsuits, said the office has a longstanding policy of not commenting on litigation like the Deon Jones lawsuit.
Bowser and her high-level D.C. government appointees, including Japer Bowles, director of the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, have spoken out against LGBTQ-related discrimination.
“Jones, now a 28-year veteran of the Department and nearing retirement, faced years of verbal abuse and harassment from coworkers and incarcerated people alike, including anti-gay slurs, threats, and degrading treatment,” the ACLU’s statement says.
“The prolonged mistreatment took a severe toll on Jones’s mental health, and he experienced depression, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and 15 anxiety attacks in 2021 alone,” it says.
“For years, I showed up to do my job with professionalism and pride, only to be targeted because of who I am,” Jones says in the ACLU statement. “This settlement affirms that my pain mattered – and that creating hostile workplaces has real consequences,” he said.
He added, “For anyone who is LGBTQ or living with a disability and facing workplace discrimination or retaliation, know this: you are not powerless. You have rights. And when you stand up, you can achieve justice.”
The settlement agreement, a link to which the ACLU provided in its statement announcing the settlement, states that plaintiff Jones agrees, among other things, that “neither the Parties’ agreement, nor the District’s offer to settle the case, shall in any way be construed as an admission by the District that it or any of its current or former employees, acted wrongfully with respect to Plaintiff or any other person, or that Plaintiff has any rights.”
Scott Michelman, the D.C. ACLU’s legal director said that type of disclaimer is typical for parties that agree to settle a lawsuit like this.
“But actions speak louder than words,” he told the Blade. “The fact that they are paying our client a half million dollars for the pervasive and really brutal harassment that he suffered on the basis of his identity for years is much more telling than their disclaimer itself,” he said.
The settlement agreement also says Jones would be required, as a condition for accepting the agreement, to resign permanently from his job at the Department of Corrections. ACLU spokesperson Andy Hoover said Jones has been on administrative leave since March 2022. Jones couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
“This is really something that makes sense on both sides,” Michelman said of the resignation requirements. “The environment had become so toxic the way he had been treated on multiple levels made it difficult to see how he could return to work there.”
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