Rahmanullah Lakanwal was among the Afghans who came to the United States after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. Earlier, he served in a paramilitary unit that worked with U.S. forces.
Rahmanullah Lakanwal’s path from a village in Afghanistan to the corner in Washington, D.C., where authorities say he opened fire on two National Guard troops was forged by America’s longest war.
He was 5 years old when the U.S. military invaded after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and as a young man he enlisted with a “Zero Unit,” an Afghan paramilitary force that worked with Americans.
That connection appears to have given Mr. Lakanwal a ticket out of Afghanistan when the Taliban toppled the American-backed government in 2021, allowing him to flee with his wife and children. They began a new life in Bellingham, Wash., where he worked as a delivery driver and his children played soccer in the hallways of their modest apartment complex.
On Thursday, the authorities were scrambling to understand what motivated Mr. Lakanwal to forgo that new start, drive cross-country to Washington, where officials say he fatally shot one Guard member and critically wounded another outside a Metro station.
It was also unclear why he chose the street corner where Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe and Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom of the West Virginia National Guard were patrolling on Wednesday afternoon. Officials say he ambushed them outside the Farragut West Metro station, firing repeatedly at one Guard member with a .357 revolver and then turning it on the other before he was shot himself.
Currently Mr. Lakanwal is under watch at a Washington, D.C., hospital, where he is being treated for his wounds. He is being charged with three counts of assault with intent to kill while armed, said Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. President Trump announced on Thursday evening that Specialist Beckstrom had died of her wounds, which meant the suspect was now expected to be charged with first-degree murder.
