Ten days after Thomas Wootton High School junior Solomon J. King was killed by a hit-and-run driver on Travilah Road, the car and driver have still not been located.
Solomon was walking with two friends on the 14600 block of Travilah Road, near his North Potomac home around 6:30 p.m. Friday, Nov. 12 when a vehicle veered off the road, clipped a mailbox and then hit Solomon, grazing one of his friends. Solomon died the following morning at Suburban Hospital.
The car was at first identified as being a dark Honda Accord with dark, tinted windows. The description was later broadened to simply a dark Honda with dark, tinted windows. The right-front section of the vehicle may have damage from the collision.
A poster describing the wanted vehicle distributed to media outlets Friday further described the car as being a 4-door model from 1998-2000.
Police said they have received tips through telephone lines set up for that purpose, but did not provide further detail while the investigation is ongoing.
“We have received phone calls from people who are wanting to be helpful in this investigation so far. People who want to be helpful and have told us what they see, about the cars that they see that match the description of what we’re looking for,” said Officer Derek Baliles, a spokesman for Montgomery County Police.
The teens who were walking with Solomon provided helpful information to the police but could not provide a license plate number or other information that would specifically pinpoint the car.
“Our job is twofold: to find that car, and then to put somebody behind the wheel of that car that night,” Baliles said.
He encouraged anyone who thinks they might know something to call the tip line, even if they aren’t sure they’ve found the right car.
“We’ll go out and take a look at the car and see if it is consistent,” Baliles said. “Once we find that car, that car will speak.”
The degree to which the grieving family wishes to publicize the life of their lost son or participate publicly in the investigation is a personal decision. But sometimes the personal insight sparks a tip that opens up the investigation, Baliles said.
Witnesses might speak up “when [they] hear about and read and see who Solomon King was, what his dreams were, and what his potential was, and to think that they were all ended abruptly by someone,” Baliles said. “What we’re hoping is that people will hear the story, see the life of Solomon King and be touched,” he said.