Justin Fairfax was once a rising Democratic star before scandal sank his career

In the days after Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam became engulfed in a scandal over a racist photo on his medical school yearbook in 2019, Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax looked poised to ascend to the post and become the state’s second Black governor.

That never happened. Soon after, Fairfax dealt with his own scandal when two women came forward accusing him of sexually assaulting them years earlier. Though Fairfax denied the allegations and was never charged, his reputation was tarnished.

He spiraled in recent years, according to court documents and a friend, and on Thursday — seven years after he nearly became governor — police say he killed himself and his wife, Dr. Cerina Fairfax, while their two children were home. The murder-suicide came in the middle of a divorce and just two weeks before a judge had told him he would have to move out of the home he shared with his estranged wife in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Annandale.

Here is what to know about Justin Fairfax’s rise and fall.

From lawyer to lieutenant governor

A former federal prosecutor and civil litigator, Fairfax first unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for attorney general in 2013, then won the race for lieutenant governor in 2017, when he ran on the same ticket as Northam.

Many of Northam’s supporters said the former Republican was a pragmatic choice for governor given his ability to work across the aisle. Fairfax was also praised for his somewhat moderate positions on polarizing political issues like confederate statues and minimum wage.

But just one year into their first term, a racist photo in Northam’s medical school yearbook reemerged, showing a person in blackface and another in full Ku Klux Klan robes. The governor didn’t say which costume he was wearing.

There were widespread calls for Northam to resign. Had he done so, Fairfax would’ve been his successor.

Before that could happen, two women came forward accusing Fairfax of sexually assaulting them.

The accusations and the fallout

Vanessa Tyson said Fairfax sexually assaulted her in his hotel room during the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004. Fairfax was a Columbia Law School student serving as an aide to Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards at the time.

Tyson said Wednesday that she was left deeply humiliated and ashamed but that she suppressed the memory to focus on her career as an academic. She only began to tell friends about the alleged assault in October 2017, after seeing a photo of Fairfax with an article about his campaign.

Two days after Tyson came forth, Meredith Watson issued her own statement accusing Fairfax of raping her in 2000, when they were students at Duke University.

The Associated Press does not typically name people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they come forward publicly, as Tyson and Watson have.

The accusations exploded into public view and resulted in political chaos. Many Democrats who had carefully withheld judgment after the first accusation against Fairfax immediately condemned him after his second accuser came forward. Soon after, both Democrats and Republicans called for Fairfax to step down, echoing simultaneous demands for Northam’s resignation.

Despite immense pressure from the public and other politicians, Northam and Fairfax both finished their four-year term in office, which ended in 2022.

Failed political comeback

Fairfax tried unsuccessfully to recharge his political ascent in 2021 when he ran for governor.

Throughout his campaign, his team acknowledged that the sexual assault allegations changed the state of the race. Fairfax insisted at the time that voters, particularly Black people, would see through what he insisted — without proof — was a smear campaign.

Fairfax finished fourth out of five candidates and got less than 4% of the vote.

Court filings show that Fairfax had financial challenges following the sexual assault allegations, which prompted his resignation as a partner at a prestigious law firm. According to court documents, his “mental and emotional health” suffered, and he drank heavily and withdrew from his family.

In 2022, Justin Fairfax bought a handgun with money intended for horseback riding lessons for his children, and that he left home with the gun and some clothes in a suitcase at some point that year, the court records showed. He was later found in the woods of a public park near the home.

Fairfax killed himself and his wife weeks before a judge’s deadline to move out of their family home, the court document shows.