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A long-running dispute over mold, moisture, and water damage in a luxury penthouse has emerged as the potential motive in a deadly Thursday morning shooting near Logan Circle in Washington, D.C.
Police have identified the gunman as 55-year-old Dr. Matt Wade Lambert, a licensed emergency medicine physician who had recently worked as a healthcare consultant. Lambert lived in a roughly 1,200-square-foot seventh-floor penthouse in the Metropole condominium building in the 1500 block of 15th Street NW, which he purchased in 2016 for about $1.095 million. He was also a member of the Vida Fitness gym on the building’s ground floor.
Investigators say Lambert had been locked in an ongoing conflict with the building’s condominium association and management over maintenance problems that he claimed made his unit uninhabitable since 2024. Court records show he filed a lawsuit in D.C. Superior Court in March 2025 alleging that exterior facade work caused water intrusion, black mold, and more than $100,000 in damages.
The association, in response, pointed to excess moisture from laundry dryers at the gym below. Mediation was scheduled for next March.
An X account linked to Lambert, titled OfMiceandMold, repeatedly documented the complaints and shared what he called a “manifesto” in the form of an engineering report in the minutes before the shooting.
“We do know that there has been an ongoing dispute between the suspect in this case and the building, condo, homeowners association, management regarding maintenance issues – mold and the like – that there was a civil case that he filed against them. So, we believe that it’s related to that,” Interim Metropolitan Police Department Chief Jeffery W. Carroll told reporters on Thursday evening.
D.C. Councilmember Brooke Pinto, whose ward includes the neighborhood, added, “This morning we believe the suspect walked into Vida to target somebody that he had been in active litigation with over a condo issue, and it’s just so sad and so senseless to kill someone over a dispute that should be worked out reasonably.”
The violence unfolded just before 8 a.m. on Thursday, November 12 inside Vida Fitness near 15th and P streets NW, about a mile north of the White House. Police say Lambert entered the gym with a handgun and fatally shot 46-year-old James Stuart, the building’s property manager, who was also a gym member.
Stuart was ultimately pronounced dead at the scene.
Lambert then returned to his seventh-floor apartment, barricaded himself, and opened fire from the patio with a rifle, striking four additional people — two men and two women. One of the victims, a construction worker, was shot in the head.
One of the injured remains in critical condition as of Thursday evening, while the others sustained non-life-threatening wounds. Officers who arrived within roughly 30 seconds of the initial 911 call later recovered three firearms from the apartment, including the handgun used in the gym, the rifle used from the balcony, and a shotgun. None were registered in the District of Columbia.
During phone negotiations, Lambert complained about the homeowners association and also started a fire that broke a gas line inside the unit. After about an hour, officers heard a gunshot from inside, forced entry, and found him with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Lambert was pronounced dead at the scene.
The incident prompted a massive police response, a neighborhood shelter-in-place order, and temporary lockdowns at nearby schools before authorities declared the scene safe later in the morning.
While police have not declared a definitive motive and the investigation continues, officials have consistently linked the targeted killing of the building manager and the subsequent shootings to the bitter, years-long condominium dispute.
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