ZAJKO CHARGED WITH MURDER OF PARENTS IN PENNSYLVANIA

Michelle Zajko, a member of the group known as the Zizians, has been charged with murder, burglary and conspiracy in connection with the deaths of her parents Rita and Richard Zajko, according to Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse. The couple was shot dead in their home on New Year's Eve 2022 in Chester Heights, Pennsylvania. Zajko has been held in Maryland on unrelated charges since February 2025 and has denied involvement in her parents' deaths. Rouse stated that Zajko did not act alone in the killings.

Police recorded a car arriving at the residence via a neighbour's doorbell camera, followed by voices including someone shouting "Mom!" and another exclaiming "Oh my God! God, God!" according to law enforcement accounts. In court filings, Zajko suggested her father may have killed her mother and then himself. Authorities had long identified Zajko as a person of interest in the double homicide. She faces separate federal charges related to providing a gun allegedly used to kill U.S. Border Patrol Agent David Maland in January 2025.

The Zizians is described by authorities as a group of young computer scientists whose members have been linked to six deaths since 2022 across multiple states. These deaths include an attack on a California landlord, the subsequent killing of that landlord, the Pennsylvania shootings and a Vermont highway shootout. Zajko was arrested in Maryland alongside Daniel Blank and Jack "Ziz" LaSota, whom authorities describe as the group's leader. Court records did not immediately show whether Zajko has legal representation in the Pennsylvania case as of Wednesday.