Federal authorities in New York have arrested an Anchorage man in connection with a double homicide.
Jalonni Blackshear, 39, is alleged to have fled Alaska prior to police discovering the bodies of his 35-year-old wife and 14-year-old daughter dead as a result of shotgun blasts, according to court documents filed Wednesday following the arrest.
Blackshear had been charged with sexual abuse of a minor, according to the court documents, which were filed in New York to support a federal charge that Blackshear fled Alaska to avoid prosecution.
The documents say Blackshear had been an Alaska correctional officer. That was until late March, when investigators executed a DNA search warrant on him in the child sex abuse case and he abruptly quit his job, the filing says.
Anchorage police used cell tower data to find cellphones belonging to Blackshear and one of the victims on Staten Island in New York, according to the court documents.
State and federal officials are working to extradite Blackshear back to Alaska.
Casey Grove is host of Alaska News Nightly, a general assignment reporter and an editor at Alaska Public Media. Reach him atcgrove@alaskapublic.org. Read more about Caseyhere.
