Two high school students were found dead from gunshot wounds Tuesday afternoon in a car in a Blacksburg, Virginia, parking garage.
John Hawley identified the 17-year-old girl found dead in the passenger seat of her car as his daughter, Serenity Hawley, a Blacksburg High School senior who would have turned 18 on Thursday, the Roanoke Times reported.
Her ex-boyfriend, a senior and former varsity football player, got into his daughter’s vehicle from the passenger side and shot her, then shot himself, Hawley said.
Blacksburg police did not identify the victim or her killer but said a weapon was found in the vehicle. They said they were working with Montgomery County Public Schools “to ensure that any servics MCPS staff or students may need are available.”
Hawley told the Times that the family, including Serenity’s four brother’s and sisters, is “heartbroken” and that the support from the Blacksburg community has been “really overwhelming.”
“She was just very vivacious. She was just larger than life. And to know that she is gone is just unreal,” the girl’s mom, Heather Waldron. told WSLS.
Hawley’s family identified the killer as Croney Monk and said the school had issued a no-contact order for the pair after an incident about a month ago. Waldron said she encouraged her daughter to get a restraining order against Monk, but she didn’t.
“The biggest thing is to watch for red flags. Don’t ignore or think that this wouldn’t happen to your daughter, because I would never in a million years thought this would happen to my daughter,” she said.
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[Featured image: Serenity Hawley/family handout]