A couple in New Market, Maryland, were gunned down as they lay in bed early Sunday while their children hid inside the home, in what authorities are calling a “rage killing.”
The two victims were identified as Crimea Malita Baker, 33, of New Market, and Sean Antoine Lange, 34, of Arlington, Virginia, according to the Frederick County Sheriff’s Office.
The children, who were found inside the home by authorities, are all under the age of 13 and were unharmed, the sheriff’s office said. Baker was the mother of all four children inside the home and Lange was the father of one of the children.
Investigators do not believe the shootings were random or that there is any threat to the community.
“This was clearly a rage killing by an angry, enraged person,” Frederick County Sheriff Chuck Jenkins said at a news conference Tuesday.
Authorities have not released any information about the suspect.
Deputies were called to the home in the 7000 block of Mandalong Court in New Market for a reported shooting around 7 a.m. Sunday, the sheriff said. Once inside, they found the bodies of Baker and Lange lying in bed in an upstairs bedroom with multiple gunshot wounds.
Jenkins said there were 42 rounds fired at the two victims at close range.
Authorities believe the shooting happened around 1:30 a.m., based on the conversation with the children who were inside the home at the time of the shooting.
The sheriff said, based on the conversations with the children, it appears they “hid in the house until morning, until they felt safe to try to figure out what had happened.”
One of the children went upstairs and discovered the bodies in the bedroom, the sheriff said.
The sheriff added, “This was really a heinous, targeted double murder — a crime of rage and anger,” Jenkins said. “This is the type of crime that shocks the conscience of everyone in Frederick County.”
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