1 dead and 4 injured in Washington, DC, shooting, police say

The gunman who killed one person and injured four others in Washington, DC before barricading himself in a condo building on Thursday morning was an emergency room doctor who had been locked in a legal dispute with the building’s management over a mold problem in his unit.

Police identified Matt Lambert as the shooter who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after shooting several people in the gym and parking garage of the Metropole, a luxury condo building near Logan Circle.

Lambert sued the Metropole Condominium Association in March 2025, alleging that the association’s maintenance work had caused water and mold damage in his penthouse condo unit.

Two witnesses told CNN that Lambert placed phone calls shortly after the building was evacuated to explain his actions. One of the witnesses, Sean McClafferty, who lives in the Metropole, says he was standing with the building’s concierge a block away when the concierge received a phone call from Lambert.

“Essentially, he told our concierge, ‘This is what I need to do to get attention,’” McClafferty said.

A second witness, who asked not to be named, said he heard Lambert say over the phone that this was how he decided to resolve his dispute with the building’s board.

Lambert bought his 1,200-square-foot unit for just over $1 million in 2016, property records show. According to Lambert’s lawsuit, his unit experienced damage from “suspected water intrusion, mold, (and) significant moisture accumulation” caused by work to renovate the building’s façade starting in 2023.

By September 2024, the unit was showing signs of water damage, but the condo association denied that mold was present and was “ignoring Plaintiff’s very real mold complaints,” the lawsuit stated.

In November 2024, Lambert hired a company to remove the unit’s mold-contaminated walls and flooring. He said in the lawsuit that he avoided using his shower or HVAC system for six months, but the unit continued to experience excessive moisture. Lambert also hired a firm to conduct further testing in May 2026, which identified “microbial contamination and/or mold growth” in the unit, according to court documents.

Lambert had spent more than $290,000 investigating and responding to the damage as of May, according to the complaint.

In court documents, the condo association and its property management company denied some of Lambert’s claims and argued that the association “did not cause the Plaintiff’s alleged injuries and damages.” The case was scheduled to go to a mediation session in March 2027, court records show.

An attorney who had represented Lambert in his lawsuit against the condo association described his client in an interview with CNN as calm, conscientious, and nonviolent, and expressed shock at the idea that he was responsible for the shooting. That attorney added he thought the lawsuit had been going well.

Lambert was born and grew up in Parkersburg, West Virginia, according to the Amazon description of a memoir he published.

Lambert wrote on a personal website that he had more than two decades of clinical experience and has worked at various health care technology companies.

He received his medical degree from Marshall University in West Virginia, and completed a residency at West Virginia University, according to the website.

Matt Wade Lambert was named by police as the man who is allegedly responsible for the shooting in Washington, DC’s Logan Circle neighborhood.

Police have identified 55-year-old Matt Wade Lambert as the man who allegedly shot five people, killing one, in Washington, DC’s Logan Circle neighborhood today. before shooting himself.

The Department of Justice’s Office for Victims of Crime has set up a website for victims of today’s deadly shooting in the nation’s capital.

“OVC offers our sympathy for the victims and witnesses impacted by the shooting in the Logan Circle neighborhood of Washington, D.C. on November 12, 2026,” it says.

Numbers and links listed include the VictimConnect Resource Center, Disaster Distress Helpline, the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline and the DC’s victims’ compensation program.

It also includes specific resources to support children, law enforcement and faith leaders.

Washington Metropolitan Police stand outside the doorway of the VIDA fitness center in Washington, DC, on Thursday.

Sahil Kapoor says he was walking downstairs in the multi-level VIDA gym when he heard a gunshot. At the bottom of the flight of stairs he was walking down, Kapoor said, he saw a man with blood gushing out of his head in a seating area near the cardio section of the gym.

“I usually sit in those chairs before I have a training session,” Kapoor told CNN. “If I had taken five or six more steps, I would have been right there.”

“To hear a gunshot within feet of you — it just stuns you,” he added.

Kapoor says he and a small group of other people evacuated the building. Once they were near Milk Bar, a dessert shop across the street from the gym, they heard more gunshots. “We all took off running,” he said.

A man who lives in the building where the suspect barricaded himself said that he was evacuated from his apartment by armed police.

The man, Charles Webb, said he heard the fire alarm this morning and then noticed water coming through his apartment ceiling. He said the hallway was flooded and the lights were off.

Police then opened his door “with guns drawn” and said he needed to leave immediately. They had him evacuate via the stairwell with his hands raised.

“It was really terrifying,” Webb said.

Law enforcement respond to reports of a shooting in Washington, DC, on Thursday.

One person is dead and four others were injured in a shooting today in Washington, DC’s Logan Circle neighborhood, according to the Metropolitan Police Department.

The gunman is dead from a self-inflicted gunshot, law enforcement sources say.

Here’s what we know about the incident:

CNN’s Nicky Robertson, Michael Williams, Holmes Lybrand, Kit Maher, Chris Boyette, Hannah Rabinowitz, Adrienne Vogt, Lauren Chadwick, Sarah Ferris and Kristen Holmes contributed to this report.

The shelter-in-place order for the area around the shooting site has been lifted, according to DC’s Metropolitan Police Department.

Residents and businesses in the 1500 block of 15th Street NW “may resume normal activity,” according to an alert sent by police.

“Follow instructions from public safety officials in the area,” police said.

An emergency reception center has been set up at Stead Park on 17th Street NW and P Street NW.

Eyewitness was on a treadmill at the DC gym where the shooting broke out

2:09 • Source: CNN

Eyewitness was on a treadmill at the DC gym where the shooting broke out

2:09

Anthony Mirones said he was inside VIDA Fitness, on the treadmill, when he heard a “loud bang” at the gym where the shooting occurred.

“And I’m thinking like a bouncy ball popped or a painting [fell] on the floor,” Mirones said, before he went toward the area of commotion and saw someone laying on the floor.

Mirones said, “I take a peek and like, he’s not moving at all,” adding that he saw blood on the floor.

He said people began evacuating shortly after a fire alarm sounded.

Mirones said he heard more gunshots once he was outside the gym, where police were trying to get a description of the shooter from witnesses. “And then we all just start running and people are scattering everywhere,” he said.

Mirones said he ran and took shelter in a coffee shop, “and I didn’t move.”

Mirones described the situation as “surreal.” He sent a text to his family to reassure them of his safety. “I’m sure they were surprised,” he said.

Victoria Stafford was in a yoga class at a gym in Logan Circle when she heard an “incredibly loud noise” about 45 minutes in.

At first, she thought it was heavy weights, but the instructor paused the class and told them to leave everything. She and others piled into a laundry room, while gym workers barricaded the door.

Stafford was trying to text her friends and family from her watch since she didn’t have her phone.

“You’re in that room for so long every moment feels like an eternity,” she told CNN.

They turned off the laundry room machines and tried to stay silent.

She said she saw an unresponsive man on the floor as well as a pool of blood.

“It was just really devastating to see, and all I could think in that moment was wow there is a person just like myself who is trying to get their morning gym session in, who has a family, who has loved ones … and they thought that they were going to come home to them and they’re not going to today,” she said of the person she saw unresponsive in the gym.

Police officers work at the site of a shooting in Washington, DC, on Thursday.

Two witnesses said they heard a fire alarm sounding in the apartment building at the corner of 15th and P streets NW, a trendy, bustling area that includes a Sweetgreen, a Whole Foods and a VIDA gym.

Peter Morris, a CNN photojournalist, said he was making coffee in his apartment when he heard the alarm. He went out to his balcony, which faces P St. NW, and saw DC Fire and EMS engines begin to arrive. Morris said he then heard 10 shots.

Morris, who also works as a volunteer firefighter, said he saw people running from 15th St. NW to P St. NW and heard the fire truck that had just arrived lay on its horn for an extended period of time, which Morris says in firefighting circles could indicate a distress signal.

A second witness, who spoke with CNN on the condition that his name not be used, said the building began flooding with water pouring through elevators and stairwells while the fire alarm was sounding. This witness evacuated the building, where he saw a woman in an alley, bleeding from her head. The witness said he retrieved the woman’s dog while she was being tended to by first responders.