Baltimore prosecutors announced on Wednesday the arrest of Dion Thompson in connection with the cold case homicide of off-duty Washington, D.C., police officer, Sgt. Tony Anthony Mason Jr., in 2017.
Thompson, who was 18 at the time of the incident, is accused of fatally shooting Sgt. Mason while he was sitting in a parked car with a woman he was dating. The woman was also shot but survived the attack.
The case had remained unsolved for five years until a tip received early last year reignited the investigation, leading authorities to Thompson. Currently serving time in a federal prison on unrelated charges, Thompson, now 24, was charged based on the account of an individual who knew him but did not witness the crime directly.
The charging documents do not provide a clear motive for the shooting but suggest that Thompson, feeling paranoid, opened fire on the parked car's occupants, assuming they posed a threat to him. Upon learning from the news that the victim was a police officer, Thompson allegedly disposed of the vehicle he was driving on the night of the shooting in Philadelphia.
While the charging documents mention two other individuals allegedly involved in the incident, no additional charges have been filed so far. Sgt. Mason, a 17-year veteran of Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department, was unarmed and not wearing any identifying law enforcement attire at the time of the attack. Background checks on both Mason and his companion revealed no criminal or gang affiliations.
Metropolitan Police Department Chief Pamela Smith expressed relief that progress has been made in bringing the perpetrator to justice, stating, 'For far too long, the details surrounding Sergeant Mason’s tragic death have remained a painful mystery. While we cannot erase the pain of loss or the memories of that day, we can take solace in the fact that the person responsible is being brought to justice.'
Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates highlighted that this case marks the first prosecution undertaken by the office’s new cold case unit, underscoring the commitment to resolving long-standing unsolved crimes.
