The suspect in Wednesday’s shooting of two National Guard members in downtown Washington, D.C. is being charged with first-degree murder after one of the victims died.
Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, with the West Virginia National Guard died from her wounds, President Donald Trump announced Thursday. Speaking with troops on Thanksgiving, Trump also said that the other victim, Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, remains hospitalized and is “fighting for his life.”
Beckstrom was assigned to the 863rd Military Police Company, 111th Engineer Brigade of the West Virginia Army National Guard. She joined the military in June 2023. Wolfe, with Force Support Squadron, 167th Airlift Wing, West Virginia Air National Guard, joined in 2019.
“Sarah served with courage, extraordinary resolve, and an unwavering sense of duty to her state and to her nation,” West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey said on Thursday in a statement. “She answered the call to serve, stepped forward willingly, and carried out her mission with the strength and character that define the very best of the West Virginia National Guard.”
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That evening, National Guard troops deployed to the capital lined the streets on Thanksgiving night for a fallen soldier procession. They saluted as her body was transferred from the hospital.
The two were shot near the Farragut West Metro station in downtown Washington, D.C. Wednesday afternoon. The suspect in the shooting, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was shot and taken into custody Wednesday. Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan national, was initially set to be charged with multiple counts of assault with intent to kill; the charges were upgraded today following Beckstrom’s death. Lakanwal was admitted into the United States in 2021, as part of Operation Allies Welcome, meant to get Afghan partners who helped the United States out of Afghanistan following the fall of the U.S.-backed government. Reuters, citing a law enforcement dossier on Lakanwal, reports he applied for asylum in December 2024, which was approved this spring. Prior to this week’s shooting he was living in Washington state.
Before coming to the United States, Lakanwal worked with Afghan “zero units,” according to multiple media reports. Those units, part of the Afghan security forces, worked with the CIA and carried out extensive operations including night raids and other counter-terror activities. The groups have been repeatedly accused of serving as death squads in Afghanistan and carrying out several human rights abuses.
Both Beckstrom and Wolfe are among the more than 300 West Virginia National Guard troops sent to the capital this fall in support of the Trump administration’s military deployment in the district, following allegations of rampant crime there. According to West Virginia Adjutant General Maj. Gen. Jim Seward, both Beckstrom and Wolfe have been in D.C. since the beginning of the West Virginia National Guard’s deployment to the capital.
In the aftermath of the shooting, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said that the military plans to deploy 500 more National Guard troops to Washington, D.C. It’s not clear where those additional troops will be drawn from, or how ongoing legal fights will impact that deployment. Last week a federal judge ruled that the deployment violates federal law, but stayed the ruling until Dec. 11 to allow the Trump administration to appeal, which it did. Similar National Guard deployments in Illinois, Oregon and California have been ruled illegal by federal judges.
