A man suspected of shooting and killing a man inside a home in Reston, Virginia, Wednesday afternoon has been arrested after an extensive police search of the area.
The deadly shooting happened at a home in the 12300 block of Fan Shell Court in Reston, Fairfax County police said. Police haven’t named the victim, but said they believe he lived at the home and that the victim and suspect knew each other.
Nearby schools were put on lockdown while officers searched for the suspect, 23-year-old Marvin Fernando Morales-Ortiz.
The bulk of the police search appeared to happen in and around the 12200 block of Laurel Glade Court, about a quarter of a mile away from the home where the shooting took place.
Video from Chopper4 shows a group of officers in tactical gear with a K9 searching outside some apartments in that area. The dog repeatedly sniffed a bicycle that was left laying on its side in the roadway.
Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis said a short time later that Morales-Ortiz took off on a bicycle and police had recovered it.
Then, moments after Davis spoke to reporters, police said they had Morales-Ortiz in custody. Chopper4 captured video of officers surrounding the suspect and taking him out of the wooded area where they found him, about a mile away from the shooting scene. Police say he still had the gun on him they believed was used in the crime.
Davis said Morales-Ortiz knew the victim and had lived at the home on Fan Shell Court recently.
During the manhunt, police released a photo of the suspect walking near the home. It appeared to have been captured from a neighbor’s surveillance camera.
“If we didn’t have the photo, we wouldn’t feel comfortable corroborating the name. So the photo gave us the ability to develop a name. We put the name and the photograph together with confidence and immediately shared it with the community,” Davis said. “So without the community immediately stepping up and sharing a photograph of our killer, we might be in a different place. We might not even have our shooter in custody.”
Dogwood Elementary School and Hunter Woods Elementary School were put in a “secure the building” status during the two-hour search, meaning all outside doors are locked and people cannot come and go from the buildings, police said. School lessons are going on as normal inside the schools.
A number of police officers and cruisers were spotted at Dogwood Elementary.
Police say Morales-Ortiz lived in the home where the shooting happened. They said they’re not sure if he was living there now, but he did at least recently.
Police said murder charges against Morales-Ortiz are pending, and he’ll likely have an arraignment on Thursday or Friday.
Morales-Ortiz was also in court Tuesday on other felony charges for malicious woulding assault and for brandishing a firearm, Fairfax County police and the Fairfax County Office of the Commomwealth’s Attorney confirmed to News4. The charges were dropped and he was released out of custody.
The Fairfax County Office of the Commomwealth’s Attorney said in a statement, “Unfortunately, these charges were nolle prossed in court yesterday; prosecutors were unable to move forward with the case because the victim told police that they were out of the country and would not be coming to court to cooperate in proceedings. Sadly, without the victim’s necessary testimony, we could not move forward with the case.”
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