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Investigation continues for murder of 17-year-old trans woman in Hampton, Va.

Man arrested for shooting at party where witnesses say suspect confronted victim

Published

4 years ago

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Ariyanna Mitchell (Photo via Facebook)

Hampton, Va. police say they are continuing their investigation into the April 2 shooting death of a 17-year-old transgender woman who witnesses say was shot multiple times at a party by the boyfriend of a young woman who was arguing with a friend of the victim.

Police said the victim, who friends have identified as Hampton resident Ariyanna Mitchell, was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after 2:00 a.m. on April 2 at a residence on the 500 block of Wine Street in Hampton.

A statement released by Hampton police says the investigation into the incident led to the arrest on April 9 of Jimmy Leshawn Williams, 19, on charges of one count of Murder and one count of Use of Firearm in Commission of a Felony in connection with Mitchell’s murder. The statement says Williams, a resident of Nofolk, Va., was taken into custody in Chesapeake, Va.

Local TV station WAVY 10 reported it spoke with a friend of Mitchell who said the shooting stemmed from a fight at a party in Norfolk earlier in the night of the shooting between the friend and Williams’ girlfriend.  

“{Williams’ girlfriend] was going to get her boyfriend to shoot me and everybody in this house,” WAVY quoted the friend as saying. According to WAVY, the friend said the bullets fired by Williams were meant for her, not Mitchell.

The TV news station further reports that court documents disclose that a witness told police Williams arrived at the house in Hampton where the party was taking place in his girlfriend’s car and asked Mitchell whether she was involved in a fight involving his girlfriend. The witness reportedly told police Mitchel said she was involved. Other press reports have cited sources saying Mitchell intervened to help protect her friend, who got into an altercation with Williams’ girlfriend.

“Paperwork says the witness told police Williams asked if Mitchell was a boy or a girl,” WAVY TV news reports in one of its stories on the incident. “Documents say Mitchell replied a boy, and that’s when Williams shot Mitchell multiple times,” WAVY reports.

Jimmy Leshawn Williams (Photo courtesy of the Hampton Police Department)

Friends of Mitchell have said she identified as a girl.

An earlier police statement released at the time the murder occurred, which appealed to the public for information about the then unidentified suspect, identifies victim Mitchell as a “17-year-old male” and does not release Mitchell’s name.

Hampton police spokesperson Sgt. Reggie Williams told the Washington Blade it was the victim’s family that identified Mitchell as a male.

“Because the victim is a juvenile, we don’t identify the victim in our press releases,” Williams said. “But according to the family, the victim is a 17-year-old male,” he said.

Williams said copies of the police report for the incident would not be available at this time because the investigation is continuing.

“The motive and circumstances surrounding this incident remain under investigation and there is no further information to release at this time,” the earlier police statement released at the time of the murder says.

An obituary for Mitchell posted on the website of the ME Fisher Funeral Home in Newport News, Va., which handled funeral arrangements for Mitchell, appears to contradict the police claim that Mitchell’s parents identified Mitchel as a male. The obituary, which presumably was prepared from information provided by Mitchell’s family, refers to Mitchell as a woman and uses her female first name.

“Ariyanna was a student in her junior year at the East End Academy under the direction of Mrs. Ruby Gilliam, CEO,” the obituary says. “She was an avid member of the Triple E (Electra Eagles Elite) Dance Academy under the guidance of Mrs. Pandora Carter,” the obituary continues.  “Ariyanna loved dancing and styling hair. She was truly unique, funny, and loved by everyone.”

The obituary identifies Mitchell’s parents, Kashunda Mitchell and Marvin Chadwick, and six siblings along with grandparents, aunts, and seven cousins as among Mitchell’s surviving family members.  

However, the obituary, while using female pronouns and using her chosen first name of Aryanna, also uses in its headline a male first name.

The Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group, said in a statement that Mitchell’s death marked at least the 11th violent murder of a transgender or gender non-conforming person in the U.S. in 2022. The HRC statement says the group was aware of at least 57 transgender or gender non-conforming deaths in 2021 due to violence, which it says was the largest number of fatal trans violence incidents recorded in a single year since it began tracking anti-trans violence in 2013.

“We say ‘at least’ because too often these deaths go unreported – or misreported,” the HRC statement says, adding that the number of trans murders could be far greater than the numbers reported by law enforcement agencies.

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Virginia

Democrats increase majority in Va. House of Delegates

Tuesday was Election Day in state.

Published

3 days ago

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November 5, 2025

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Virginia Capitol (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Democrats on Tuesday increased their majority in the Virginia House of Delegates.

The Associated Press notes the party now has 61 seats in the chamber. Democrats before Election Day had a 51-48 majority in the House.

All six openly gay, lesbian, and bisexual candidates — state Dels. Rozia Henson (D-Prince William County), Laura Jane Cohen (D-Fairfax County), Joshua Cole (D-Fredericksburg), Marcia Price (D-Newport News), Adele McClure (D-Arlington County), and Mark Sickles (D-Fairfax County) — won re-election.

Lindsey Dougherty, a bisexual Democrat, defeated state Del. Carrie Coyner (R-Chesterfield County) in House District 75 that includes portions of Chesterfield and Prince George Counties. (Attorney General-elect Jay Jones in 2022 texted Coyner about a scenario in which he shot former House Speaker Todd Gilbert, a Republican.)

Other notable election results include Democrat John McAuliff defeating state Del. Geary Higgins (R-Loudoun County) in House District 30. Former state Del. Elizabeth Guzmán beat state Del. Ian Lovejoy (R-Prince William County) in House District 22.

Democrats increased their majority in the House on the same night they won all three statewide offices: governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general.

Narissa Rahaman is the executive director of Equality Virginia Advocates, the advocacy branch of Equality Virginia, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy group, last week noted the election results will determine the future of LGBTQ rights, reproductive freedom, and voting rights in the state.

Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin in 2024 signed a bill that codified marriage equality in state law.

The General Assembly earlier this year approved a resolution that seeks to repeal the Marshall-Newman Amendment that defines marriage in the state constitution as between a man and a woman. The resolution must pass in two successive legislatures before it can go to the ballot.

Shreya Jyotishi contributed to this article.

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Virginia

Gay Republican loses race for Virginia lieutenant governor

John Reid became first out nominee for statewide office in Va.

Published

3 days ago

on

November 5, 2025

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John Reid lost his bid for Virginia lieutenant governor. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

John Reid, a gay conservative former radio talk show host in Richmond for many years, lost his race as the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor in Virginia on Tuesday, falling short of becoming the state’s first openly gay person to win a statewide office.

According to the Virginia Board of Elections, with votes counted in 129 of the state’s 133 localities, Democrat Ghazala F. Hashmi, a member of the Virginia State Senate, captured 55.45 percent of the vote, with 1,822,889 votes compared to Reid, who received 44.30 percent with 1,456,335 votes.

The election board results at 11:30 p.m. on election night also showed there were 8,391 write-in votes cast in the lieutenant governor’s race at 0.26 percent.

While Reid fell short of becoming Virginia’s first out LGBTQ statewide office holder, Hashmi broke another barrier by becoming both the state and the nation’s first Muslim woman elected to a statewide office.

The Progressive Voters Guide has reported that Hashmi supports LGBTQ rights  as part of a broader progressive agenda that includes public education, reproductive rights, and environmental justice. 

Gay longtime Virginia State Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria) endorsed Hashmi’s candidacy and told the Washington Blade he recently took her on a campaign tour of the Del Ray section of Alexandria.

In an interview with the Blade in April, Reid responded to a question of what message he had for LGBTQ voters in Virginia.

“Well, the thing I would say to gay voters who are looking and examining the candidates, is that I was out of the closet as a gay Republican publicly in very difficult rooms where people weren’t accepting of gay men – long before Donald Trump said I don’t care about this stuff,” he said.

“So even though I’m a Republican I know some people in the LGBT community are reflexively hostile to Republicans,” he told the Blade, “I took that step in public, and I think I helped change a lot of minds within the Republican Party and within central Virginia, which continues to be pretty conservative place, by being true to who I am.”

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Virginia

Jones elected next Va. AG

Former delegate to succeed Republican Jason Miyares.

Published

4 days ago

on

November 4, 2025

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Jay Jones (Photo via Jay Jones/Facebook)

Former state Del. Jay Jones on Tuesday defeated incumbent Attorney General Jason Miyares in the state’s attorney general race.

Miyares, a Republican who was a former member of the Virginia House of Delegates, has been attorney general since 2022. Miyares lost to his Democratic challenger by a 46.8-52.8 percent margin.

Miyares in a 2023 letter to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin said school districts must adhere to the state’s new guidelines for transgender and nonbinary students that activists say could potentially out them. Miyares also joined other state attorneys general who challenged the Biden-Harris administration’s Title IX rules that specifically protected LGBTQ students from discrimination based on their gender identity and sexual orientation.

Youngkin and Miyares earlier this year launched an investigation into how Loudoun County Public Schools has handled the case of three male high school students who complained about a transgender student in a boys’ locker room.

The election took place weeks after screenshots of Jones texting a colleague about a scenario in which he shot former Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert, a Republican.

Shreya Jyotishi contributed to this article.

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