A Gaithersburg man was sentenced Friday to eight years in prison for his role in the 2020 fatal drive-by shooting of Taijhon Wyatt, 17, of Washington, D.C., the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said in a statement.
Deandre Levy, 22, pleaded guilty in August 2023 to voluntary manslaughter while armed in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, according to the statement.
Around 9:30 p.m. Aug. 10, 2020, Wyatt was walking with a group of friends in an alley in Northwest Washington, D.C., when Trey Prillerman, who was 16 at the time, drove up in a stolen vehicle. Nelfy Hernandez, who was 17 at the time, and Levy, who was 19 at the time, then “opened fire” into the group, killing Wyatt and injuring another person, the statement said.
Officers arrived shortly after and Wyatt was pronounced dead at the scene, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The second victim was transported to a nearby hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, said a statement from the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, D.C.
Prillerman, Hernandez and Levy then fled the scene in the stolen car, which was eventually found outside of Baltimore, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Levy was arrested and charged with first-degree murder while armed (premeditated) on Dec. 31, 2020, and Hernandez and Prillerman, both of Washington, were both arrested in February 2021, according to District police.
On Friday, Prillerman was sentenced to 17 years in prison and Hernandez was sentenced to 13 years after the two men had pleaded guilty months earlier to second-degree murder while armed, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Levy’s attorneys, Thomas Healy and Steven Kiersh, were unable to be reached via phone for comment on Monday.
