Michelle Zajko, currently detained in Maryland on unrelated charges, has been formally charged with murder in the New Year's Eve 2022 deaths of her parents in Pennsylvania. Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse announced the charges Wednesday, saying Zajko did not act alone in the killings.
Rita and Richard Zajko were shot dead in their Chester Heights home on December 31, 2022. Surveillance footage from a neighbor's doorbell camera captured a vehicle arriving at the residence, followed by shouting including the words "Mom!" and expressions of distress.
Zajko faces murder, burglary, and conspiracy charges. She has consistently denied involvement and has suggested in court filings that her father may have killed her mother before taking his own life. In an April 2025 letter, she wrote: "I didn't murder my parents."
Her arrest in February 2025 came as authorities moved against members of the Zizians, a loosely organized group of computer scientists whose beliefs center on veganism, animal rights, gender identity, and artificial intelligence. The group has been linked to at least six deaths since 2022, including a California landlord's killing, an attack resulting in the death of one of their own, the Zajkos' deaths, and a Vermont highway shooting that killed a U.S. border patrol agent.
Zajko was already facing federal charges related to supplying a firearm used in the January 2025 killing of border patrol agent David Maland. She was arrested alongside Daniel Blank and Jack "Ziz" LaSota, described by authorities as the group's leader, during a Maryland property operation. All three face state charges of trespassing and weapons and drug possession.
LaSota faces additional federal charges of illegal gun possession by a fugitive and has requested a competency evaluation. Zajko has claimed in court documents that the arrests were designed to prevent the group from helping Teresa Youngblut, a member who has pleaded not guilty in Vermont to murder charges that could carry the death penalty.
Zajko was living in Vermont at the time her parents died and was questioned by police shortly after the homicide. Officers took her into custody briefly at a Pennsylvania hotel weeks later but released her without charges. LaSota, who was staying at the same hotel, was charged with obstructing the investigation and disorderly conduct.
Court records did not indicate whether Zajko has secured representation in the Pennsylvania case as of Wednesday. Her Maryland attorney did not respond to requests for comment, and the Delaware County public defender's office declined to discuss the matter.
Author James Rodriguez: "A computer scientist accused of killing her own parents and supplying weapons to a fringe group that's racked up a body count across multiple states: this is what radicalization looks like in the 21st century."
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