FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Wednesday, November 10, 2021

Maryland Man Sentenced to 151 Months in Prison for Kidnapping, Assault, and Other Crimes

Victims Included Woman and Her 13-Year-Old Granddaughter 

            WASHINGTON – A Maryland man has been sentenced to 151 months in prison for carjacking and kidnapping a grandmother and her 13-year-old granddaughter at gunpoint in Prince George’s County, Maryland, and driving them into Southeast Washington, where he then assaulted and threatened others, including a police officer.

            The announcement was made by U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves, Wayne A. Jacobs, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office Criminal Division, and Robert J. Contee III, Chief of the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD).

            Jamal Gilmore, 34, of Mount Rainier, Md., pleaded guilty in July 2021, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, to federal charges of kidnapping and possession of a firearm and ammunition by a felon, as well as District of Columbia charges of assault with a deadly weapon and assault on a police officer while armed. He was sentenced on Nov. 8, 2021, by the Honorable Royce C. Lamberth. Following his prison term, he will be placed on five years of supervised release.

            According to the government’s evidence, the chain of events began at about 8 p.m. on Saturday, May 2, 2020. The woman and her granddaughter were utilizing a rental moving truck on Southview Drive in Oxon Hill, Md. The woman was in the driver’s seat and the teenager in the front passenger seat. Gilmore approached the passenger side of the vehicle, brandished a semi-automatic handgun, got into the vehicle, and demanded the woman drive or he would kill her. He took her cellphone and ordered her to drive to a police station. However, she made a wrong turn and entered a parking lot in the rear of a building in the 2200 block of Southern Avenue SE. The parking lot led into a dead end, and Gilmore left the vehicle with the woman’s cellphone and the gun that he was carrying.

            At this point, Gilmore jumped a fence and ran into an apartment complex on 22nd Street SE. He attempted to gain access to one of the ground-floor apartments, where three people were inside—including a 10-year-old child. He demanded someone open the door. When no one complied, he fired a gunshot through the front window of the apartment. No one was injured by the shooting. Two of the apartment’s occupants fled out the back window, and one was injured while fleeing.

            Gilmore then went back outside and flagged down a police officer, banging on the rear driver’s side window of the officer’s patrol car with the handgun he was carrying. He then fled into the hallway of another nearby apartment building as other MPD officers responded to the scene. As officers arrived, he made his way to the landing between the first and second floor. He used the firearm to break the glass window on the landing, jumped out the window, and fell to the ground – still with the firearm in his hand. Gilmore was arrested on the scene and has been detained ever since.

            This investigation was conducted by the FBI Washington Field Office’s Violent Crime Task Force, in partnership with MPD and the Prince George's County Police. The task force focuses on identifying, investigating, and bringing prosecutable cases against violent offenders in the Washington, D.C. region.

            In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Graves, Special Agent in Charge Jacobs, and Chief Contee commended the work of those who investigated the case from the FBI’s Washington Field Office and Metropolitan Police Department. They also expressed appreciation for the assistance provided by the Prince George’s County, Md. Police Department. Finally, they commended the efforts of Victim/Witness Advocate Yvonne Bryant, Paralegal Specialist Catherine O’Neal, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Rachel A. Fletcher, of the Violent Crime and Narcotics Trafficking Section, who prosecuted the case.