In the summer of 2016, the life of 28-year-old Kristina Darice Quintini was tragically cut short in a violent encounter that also claimed the life of her boyfriend and injured their infant daughter. A graduate of Bay High School and an alumna of the University of Southern Mississippi, where she had been a captain of the Dixie Darlings dance team, Quintini was a well-known and beloved figure in her Bay St. Louis, Mississippi community.
Her life, however, had been marked by the recurring tragedy of gun violence, with her father and brother having been killed in separate, unrelated shootings years earlier.
On the evening of July 30, 2016, police were called to Quintini's duplex in the Bay Pines apartment complex for a welfare check. Inside, they discovered a grim scene. Quintini and her 29-year-old boyfriend, Norris Demetrius Mueller, were found deceased. An autopsy would later reveal that Quintini died from multiple gunshot wounds, while Mueller succumbed to a single gunshot to the head. Their 6-month-old daughter, Mia, was also a victim of the attack, having been shot in the shoulder. Miraculously, the infant survived her injuries and was transported to a New Orleans hospital for treatment.
The investigation into the double homicide quickly focused on a suspect, Myrick Curtis Laneaux, who was described as a close friend of the couple. Initially arrested on a charge of stealing a car belonging to Mueller's mother, Laneaux was soon charged with two counts of murder and aggravated assault in connection with the shootings. During a preliminary hearing, a police detective testified that Laneaux had confessed to a friend, stating in a frantic phone call, 'I shot Demet and Kristina. I didn't mean to do it. I didn't mean to do it.' The motive for the killings was reported to be an argument over a small amount of money.
In January 2019, Myrick Laneaux, then 29, pleaded guilty to two counts of manslaughter and one count of aggravated assault. Despite the absence of a weapon, DNA, or fingerprints at the crime scene, witness testimony, including Laneaux's own admissions to several people, built a strong case against him. A judge sentenced Laneaux to a total of 60 years in prison for his role in the deaths of Kristina Quintini and Norris Mueller, and the wounding of their young daughter, bringing a legal conclusion to a case that had deeply shaken the Bay St. Louis community.
