Former Virginia Lieutenant Gov. Justin Fairfax killed his wife, and then himself in their suburban D.C. home.
The Democrat politician was a rising star in the party before credible rape allegations ended his political career. Fairfax’s fall was swift, and he was in deep debt before he committed the heinous acts in the unassuming northern Virginia neighborhood.
Justin Fairfax was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt when wife filed for divorce
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax was more than $750,000 in debt when his estranged wife Cerina filed for divorce this past July, according to documents reviewed by The Post.
Fairfax, who shot and killed Cerina and himself early Thursday in their Annandale home, claimed in financial disclosures to have set up a private law practice out of his residence. However, his gross income was given only as “varies” and his frequency of pay was listed only as “periodic.”
The onetime Democratic rising star also claimed to have no cash on hand, credit card debt nearing $28,000, an additional personal loan or lien against him worth an estimated $25,000, and outstanding student loans worth an estimated $33,700.
Fairfax also claimed a line of credit worth $550,000 from Long Island-based mortgage lender Arcdec Capital Solutions and a separate $117,000 loan from Florida-based AHA Real Estate LLC.
Justin Fairfax ‘couldn’t find a job’ or even get legal clients after sex assault scandal, pal says
Justin Fairfax couldn’t find a job — or even get legal clients after facing sex assault claims that derailed in political career while Virginia lieutenant governor, a pal told The Post Thursday.
“He couldn’t find a job really after,” this person said of Fairfax.
After he left office in 2022, he launched a private legal practice out of his home, but was unable to retain enough clients to stay afloat in the final years of his marriage.
“I don’t know who his clients were,” the friend said.
Financial filings from the divorce show that while his legal practice made more than $400,000 in 2023, he brought in just $11,000 in 2024 and had earned $0 as of November 2025.
That didn’t sit well with wife Cerina, who was a successful dentist and had real estate holdings, according to the friend.
“She had grown up very poor and it was very important to her to have stable financial stability … and a good home for her children,” the source added.
“And when… he couldn’t get clients, he couldn’t get work, I think that’s what started the downhill of the marriage itself,” the source also said.
“That whole scandal, it’s been sort of downhill for Justin Fairfax ever since,” this person added. “It was a very concerted effort to destroy him.”
On Thursday morning, Fairfax County police said the ex-Democratic pol murdered his wife and then took his own life with a gun.
“I was stunned,” the source said. “I knew that he had been having, you know, some difficulties, but I didn’t think it was this serious. I never imagined he’d kill anybody.”
Justin Fairfax used legal maneuvers to stall divorce for months, docs show
Ex Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax used legal loopholes to stall his divorce for months — claiming that his estranged wife Cerina’s filing was not legitimate, court docs show.
The disgraced Dem – who was representing himself – repeatedly challenged his Cerina Fairfax’s divorce filing after she filed for divorce in July 2025, documents show.
At one point, Justin challenged Cerina’s claim that the two had been separated for more than a year — which is required under Virginia law for a divorce — saying that there was “no factual basis” for it.
Justin argued that while the two had begun to separate in June 2024, a post-nuptial agreement Cerina had signed in December 2024 stated that the two would work to keep their marriage together.
“While it is their hope that their marriage will be long and happy, Justin and Cerina desire at this time to anticipate and plan now for contingencies in order to preserve their marriage at this time as in the future,” the post-nuptial agreement said.
Justin also argued that Cerina only expresses a desire to permanently separate a little more than a month before he served her divorce papers.
Ultimately, however, a judge began to side with Cerina and ramped up the pressure on Justin — ordering him out of the family home on April 30, a date marked just days after he killed his wife and himself.
Justin Fairfax’s wife kept family afloat with dental practice as deadbeat pol refused to contribute
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax’s wife kept their family afloat financially in the final years of their marriage due to her dental practice, according to court records.
Dr. Cerina Fairfax pulled down nearly $11,000 per month as a dentist at her own practice and earned another $20,000 to $60,000 from investing in the office space.
She helped earn another $30,000 to $40,000 per year for the family through a realty business.
Despite having claimed $415,000 of income in 2023, Justin Fairfax declared he was dead broke in the last year — with just $147 to his name in a CashApp account.
Justin Fairfax claimed he was dead broke, only had $147 in CashApp, court papers show
Justin Fairfax claimed he was dead broke but for $147 he had in his CashApp account, court papers show.
Fairfax — who is accused of fatally shooting his wife Cerina before killing himself Thursday — claimed in divorce papers from November his bank accounts were all but empty and his only remaining money was from the cash sharing app.
The former Virginia lieutenant governor also claimed he hadn’t drawn a salary from his law firm for the past two years and that the company didn’t make any money in 2025 and only drew in $11,000 in 2024.
Fairfax claimed the last time his firm made real money was in 2023 — when it grossed of $415,000, court paper showed.
Justin Fairfax refused to pay half of family expenses, wouldn’t allow wife to buy him out of home: docs
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax refused to pay half of his family expenses and to allow wife Cerina to buy him out of their family home during their contentious divorce, court papers showed.
Cerina — who Justin fatally shot Thursday before turning the gun on himself — officially filed for divorce on July 18, 2025 in papers accusing Justin of failing to honor a 2024 agreement to divvy up household and family costs 50/50.
She also claimed that under that agreement she had an option to buy Justin out of their $910,000 Annandale home but Justin refused to let her do so, show the court papers filed by her lawyer, Amy Spain.
Cerina — Justin’s wife of 20 years — claimed at the time she filed divorce he wasn’t paying his portion of their kids’ private school tuition, their extracurriculars, the mortgage or the household expenses.
Justin “does not make any financial contributions to support [Cerina] and their children. All financial responsibilities are born exclusively by [Cerina],” the filing alleged.
Cerina also took care of the kids with next to no help from Justin, the court papers claimed.
In more recent papers from April 3, Cerina claimed Justin was falling behind on court-ordered payments and she sought to hold him in contempt.
Justin Fairfax unsuccessfully tried to sue NY Public Radio for defamation
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax sued New York Public Radio over a 2021 segment in which the media organization referenced the sexual assault allegations against him during a segment about similar allegations leveled against former NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
The case was dismissed by District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia Judge Anthony Trenga, who agreed with NYPR’s lawyer’s assertion that the suit was “meritless, unreasonable, and without any substantial basis in law or fact, and motivated by reasons other than obtaining relief against NYPR.”
The case was considered so meritless that the judge even ordered Fairfax to pay NYPR’s attorney fees and costs under Virginia’s anti-SLAPP statute — a first in the state, according to their lawyers.
NYPR argued in court it had done its due diligence, reaching out to Fairfax for comment but receiving no response. They also stated twice in the segment that Fairfax had denied the allegations against him and pledged to post his response on their website if he provided comments after the fact.
Instead of responding, Fairfax filed suit the day before the statute of limitations expired, according to Debevoise & Plimpton. He had unsuccessfully sued CBS over similar circumstances that same year.
Justin Fairfax was facing possible jail at court hearing next week, eviction from family home ahead of murder-suicide
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax was facing eviction from his home and potential jail time for contempt of court, according to stunning documents, prior to his murder-suicide. He was ordered to move out by April 30 and faced a hearing next week to divide assets with his wife, Cerina.
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Justin Fairfax kids attended pricy prep schools costing combined $56K/year
The children of former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax and his estranged wife Cerina attended a pair of prominent Roman Catholic secondary schools in the Washington, DC area.
Son Cameron, 16, who found his murdered mother’s body, is attending Gonzaga College High School in the nation’s capital, where tution for this academic year is $33,530, not including books and lunch.
Daughter Calys, 14, is a freshman at St. Paul VI Catholic High School in suburban Chantilly, Va., where tuition for Catholic students runs to $23,170 for the 2026-27 academic year.
Justin Fairfax’s 16-year-old son found mother’s bloodied body after murder-suicide: 911 calls
Former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax reportedly killed his wife, Cerina Fairfax, before taking his own life in their Virginia home. Their 16-year-old son, Cameron, made a frantic 911 call after finding his mother bleeding. Police discovered Cerina deceased and Justin Fairfax upstairs with a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
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Justin Fairfax was a raging drunk who bought gun with kids’ horseback riding money before murder-suicide: court docs
ANNANDALE, Va. — Disgraced ex Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax became a raging alcoholic and deadbeat father after his professional life and marriage unraveled — and he stole money meant for his kids to buy a gun, bombshell divorce documents obtained by The Post reveal.
The father-of-two’s apparent mental breakdown was laid bare in court filings filed in January tied to his ongoing divorce — just months before he killed his wife Cerina on Thursday in a tragic murder suicide.
Fairfax apparently was drinking so heavily that he would lock himself away in the office of his family’s home where he lived among “empty wine bottles, trash and piles of dirty laundry” — and would only surface “long enough to get food or smoke cigarettes,” the documents allege.
Ex-Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax kills wife, shoots himself in murder-suicide at million-dollar home amid ‘messy divorce,’ cops say
WASHINGTON — Embattled former Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax killed his estranged wife and himself inside their million-dollar home outside the nation’s capital early Thursday, cops said.
The 47-year-old Democrat repeatedly shot Cerina Fairfax in the basement of their Annandale residence just after midnight before turning the gun on himself in another part of the abode, according to Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis.
The couple’s two teenage children were inside the home at the time of the murder-suicide, and their son called 911 to report the shootings.
