Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax And His Wife Dead In Murder-Suicide

Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax shot and killed his wife and then killed himself, authorities announced Thursday.

Fairfax County police chief Kevin Davis said Justin Fairfax shot Dr. Cerina W. Fairfax, who was in the couple’s basement, several times before running to the home’s primary bedroom upstairs and killing himself with the same firearm.

Davis said the couple’s two teenage children were in the home at the time of the murder-suicide, which took place just after midnight. Their son is the one who called 911, and both children, one boy and one girl, “are interacting with us,” Davis said.

“That’s horrible news for the family, certainly a traumatic event for those children to live through,” he said at a press conference Thursday morning.

The couple had been going through divorce proceedings. Davis said Justin Fairfax, a Democrat, “was recently served some paperwork associated with an upcoming court proceeding that apparently led to this incident last night.”