The man accused of shooting and killing a Kentucky teacher on Catholic University’s campus last week was well known to the District’s criminal justice system. But despite frequent arrests and recommendations by prosecutors that Jaime Macedo be locked up, D.C. judges repeatedly returned the 22-year-old felon to the streets of the nation’s capital.
Macedo, arrested Tuesday and charged with shooting and killing teacher Maxwell “Max” Emerson on July 5, has three prior convictions — felony gun possession, felony burglary and a misdemeanor for attempted threats.
Court records obtained by The Washington Times show the suspect didn’t waste time violating his probation after he completed a two-year prison sentence in May 2022 for the burglary offense.
“He failed to report for mental health treatment, substance abuse treatment, drug testing, and was testing positive for cocaine,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, which prosecutes the city’s most serious crimes, wrote in a detention memorandum filed this week.
The memorandum cited an August 2022 report from the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, the District’s probation office, that Macedo had “displayed a blatant disregard to conditions set forth by the court.”
That report was filed two days after Macedo was arrested for threatening to “shoot and kill” a clerk at a 7-Eleven in Cleveland Park, according to an arrest affidavit.
He pleaded guilty to the threats offense in March, but D.C. Superior Court Judge Laura Crane, a Biden administration appointee, suspended Macedo’s 120-day prison sentence and instead put him on a one-year probation.
Police found a cut-up ankle monitor Tuesday during a search of his residence in Northeast.
Prosecutors had tried to get Macedo’s probation revoked on two separate occasions — once in October 2022, and again in January — before he was sentenced for the threats offense.
At both hearings, Superior Court Judge Peter Krauthamer, an Obama administration appointee, gave Macedo more time to become compliant.
The decisions cleared the way for Mr. Emerson’s fatal encounter with the alleged assailant last week.
Court documents show that the suspect first came across Mr. Emerson as he was exiting the Brookland-Catholic University Metro Station around 7:30 a.m. on July 5.
The Kentucky teacher, in town for a conference, appeared to give money to the assailant, but the suspect then returned it.
Camera footage shows the two walking along Michigan Avenue NE to Catholic University’s campus, with the affidavit saying that Mr. Emerson raised his arms in a “don’t shoot” manner at one point as they made the walk.
The two are next seen sitting in a plaza outside of Father O’Connell Hall shortly before 8 a.m. It was at this time that prosecutors said Mr. Emerson sent his mother a jumbled message that she translated as “Help. I’m being robbed at gunpoint.”
Prosecutors said the assailant appeared to try and snatch something from Mr. Emerson, causing the victim to spear-tackle the suspect to the ground. That is when Macedo is accused of firing one shot and killing Mr. Emerson. The suspect fled the area on foot right afterward.
“I’m [speculating] that it was kind of a hostage situation,” Steve Emerson, Max’s father, told The Times. “I don’t know if he was taking him to an ATM. I don’t know if he was taking him to an alternate location. But obviously, Max realized that this is bad news. This is a fight or flight situation.”
Macedo’s DNA was found on the inside of a ski mask recovered at the scene, according to court documents.
Macedo was also charged with felony gun possession shortly after his release in May 2022 when his brother’s neighbor shot him seemingly at random in the dead of night. Macedo retrieved a “ghost” gun he had stowed in a nearby grill and fired back.
The neighbor, John Jones, pleaded guilty to attempted assault with a dangerous weapon in September.
Prosecutors dropped the charges against Macedo, who was shot in the shoulder, on self-defense grounds because “the government could not prove that the defendant put the gun in the grill before the defendant needed to act in self-defense.”
