Police in Fairfax County, Virginia, confirmed Thursday that they found former Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax dead in his home in an apparent murder-suicide.
“I’m here to confirm the identity of our shooter in this murder-suicide that happened several hours ago as former Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax,” Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis said in a press conference Thursday morning. “Fairfax shot and killed his wife inside of their home and then shot and killed himself.”
“This has been an ongoing domestic dispute surrounding what seems to be a complicated or messy divorce,” he added.
The couple’s teenage son and daughter were at home at the time, police said.
Davis said the shooting was “certainly a traumatic event for those children to live through.”
Fairfax served as Virginia’s lieutenant governor from 2018 to 2022, alongside Gov. Ralph Northam.
Two women accused Fairfax of sexual assault in 2019. Vanessa Tyson accused Fairfax of forcing her to perform oral sex in 2004. Meredith Watson accused him of raping her in 2000, when both were at Duke University. Both accusers are black, as was Fairfax.
Fairfax compared the accusations to lynching, and denied the accusations in both cases. He married his wife Cerina in 2006.
This is a breaking news story and may be updated.
