A D.C. judge sentenced Tyjuan Bazemore to 20 years in the killing of Nyesha Walden-Hatcher.

Friday's 20-year term is the sentence the U.S. Attorney's Office said Judge Todd Edelman imposed after the July 10 guilty plea. DC Witness reported July 14 that the agreement called for 16 to 20 years and set sentencing for Sept. 18. The office's Oct. 23 release is the sentence that was announced. It does not say the Sept. 18 date was kept. MPD's March arrest release and the office's sentencing release do not give the same time or the same address for the response.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia announced Friday, Oct. 23, 2026, that Tyjuan Bazemore, 35, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced to 20 years in prison for the shooting death of his girlfriend, 27-year-old Nyesha Tranae Walden-Hatcher, on Feb. 2, 2026. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro announced the sentence. The office said Bazemore pleaded guilty on July 10, 2026, to one count of second-degree murder while armed. It said Superior Court Judge Todd Edelman sentenced him to 20 years in prison, followed by five years of supervised release. The case number on the release is 2026 CF1 003647. DC Witness reported July 14 that the plea was entered that July 10 before Judge Edelman, that defense attorney Madalyn Harvey said the agreement called for a sentence between 16 and 20 years subject to the judge's approval, and that sentencing was set for Sept. 18. The office's Oct. 23 release announces the 20-year sentence. It does not mention a Sept. 18 hearing.

According to the government's evidence, as the office described it, Bazemore and Walden-Hatcher were inside 3120 16th Street, Apartment 13, after going to a liquor store. The office said that while they were inside, Bazemore shot Walden-Hatcher in the head, causing her death. It said that after the shot he ran upstairs and returned downstairs several times, put on shoes and a hoodie, tried to knock down the camera at the foot of the staircase on the first floor, and left the apartment complex. The office said that at approximately 2:57 a.m., Metropolitan Police Department officers were dispatched to that apartment. After no answer at the door, officers pushed the door open and found Walden-Hatcher unresponsive on the floor with a single gunshot wound to the head. She was pronounced dead at the scene. The office said Bazemore then fled to Connecticut, where he was located and extradited back to D.C.

MPD's March 10, 2026 release said officers responded at approximately 3:07 a.m. on Feb. 2 to a 911 hang-up in the 3100 block of 16th Street, Northwest, and found an adult woman with a gunshot wound who was pronounced dead. MPD identified her as 27-year-old Nyesha Walden-Hatcher, of Northwest, D.C. MPD said Bazemore, 35, was arrested Feb. 10, 2026, in Middletown, Connecticut, by the Connecticut Violent Crimes Fugitive Task Force on a D.C. Superior Court warrant, and that he was extradited March 10 and charged with second-degree murder while armed. The U.S. Attorney's Office release does not give those dates. It says he fled to Connecticut, was located, and was extradited. The office said that at the time of the killing Bazemore had two open domestic violence assault cases concerning Walden-Hatcher, and that a condition of his release ordered him to stay away from her and not to possess firearms. DC Witness reported those cases were from 2025, that he had pleaded not guilty in them, and that prosecutors did not pursue them after the arrest in the killing. The office said MPD investigated the killing and Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie Dinan prosecuted it. Friday's 20-year term, and the five years of supervised release, are what Judge Edelman imposed. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.