A security guard who was fatally shot early Sunday in Southeast Washington was in uniform and appears to have exchanged gunfire with a group in an apartment complex parking lot he had been patrolling, according to a D.C. police spokesman.

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       The 33-year-old guard, Shawn Minor, a father of three who lives in Maryland, was “conducting his rounds” at The Vistas apartments when he came under fire, according to assistant D.C. police chief Andre Wright. A police spokesman said Minor had confronted a group of people before the shooting.

       D.C. police said in a statement Sunday that Minor had been working as a special police officer, a designation given to licensed security guards in the District. But a more detailed check of city records on Monday revealed Minor was not licensed and was not authorized to possess a firearm, a police spokesman said.

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       Authorities said they were working to conclusively identify the security company for which Minor worked. A representative for the D.C. Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs — which, along with D.C. police, regulates licensed security guards — did not respond to a request for comment.

       Wright said detectives recovered multiple bullet casings from different firearms at the scene. “These are perilous times,” Wright said, describing the shooting of Minor as a “heinous act.”

       Police said no arrest has been made and detectives are trying to determine what prompted the shooting, which occurred about 12:20 a.m. in the 2500 block of Elvans Road SE.

       Authorities said it appears Minor exited a vehicle and approached a group of people. The security guard and the group exchanged words, and police said it appears someone in a different group shot at Minor as he walked back to his vehicle.

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       Dustin Sternbeck, a police spokesman, said it appears Minor fired back. Sternbeck said a 9mm handgun, modified to fire rapidly as if it were fully automatic, was found near where Minor fell and was pronounced dead.

       There are about 15,000 special police officers and security officers in the District. Special police officers have arrest powers generally limited to properties to which they are assigned. Some are licensed to carry firearms. Efforts to reach representatives of the security company that police believed to have employed Minor were not successful on Monday.

       The block of Elvans Road where the shooting took place has been the site of violence several times in recent months. Police said in January they were looking for three men suspected of being involved in a shooting there. In late December, a 25-year-old man was killed.

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       In 2018, the D.C. Office of the Attorney General sued a management company that ran The Vistas in the 2500 block of Elvans Road SE and another apartment complex in the next block on the same street.

       The lawsuit alleged the complexes had been “plagued by persistent gun violence and drug-related crime,” with police having responded to more than 280 calls for suspected narcotics and firearm offenses over an 18-month period.

       In 2020, the attorney general entered a $3.5 million consent judgment with both complexes that included provisions to improve security, among many other property upgrades. The attorney general’s office said the then-owners went into bankruptcy, but the office continues to monitor the agreement with the new owners. Those owners could not be reached for comment on Monday.

       Minor’s grandmother, Shirley Minor-Beale, said she raised Minor and his two older and one younger brother in Forestville, Md., after their mother died many years ago.

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       Minor-Beale, 76, said her grandson had recently decided “to do something positive with his life” and became a security guard.

       Minor lived with his grandmother but was often with his three children — girls, ages 3 and 13, and a boy, 12, Minor-Beale said. While she knew her grandson was a security guard, she said didn’t know where he had been assigned until a friend of his called her after midnight Sunday and said he had been shot.

       She said her husband drove her about 20 minutes to the apartment complex, but she could not get close to the parking lot. She said police would let her get to her son’s body. “I didn’t know he was in such a dangerous place,” Minor-Beale said.

       She said police have not told her any information about the shooting or what might have prompted it. Directing a message to city leaders, she said: “Get rid of these guns.”