Court papers allege a New York Times executive’s elderly father-in-law admitted shooting him dead as the couple opened fire together in a California parking lot.
Jonathan McKinsey, 40, was found lying face up with multiple gunshot wounds in a Dublin, California, sports complex lot on Saturday afternoon and was pronounced dead at the scene.
Fox News reported that his wife’s parents, Shouyong Zhang, 77, and Shili Chen, 77, were arrested within minutes and later charged with murder, with prosecutors adding a special-circumstance claim that they intentionally killed him by lying in wait.
The case landed in the middle of a bitter divorce and custody fight, competing restraining-order filings, and a trail of abuse claims that never got a full hearing in court.
Several 911 callers reported gunfire at the Dublin Sports Grounds parking lot. A sergeant arrived and found McKinsey shot. Witnesses pointed to a black Honda Civic leaving the lot.
Officers made a high-risk stop nearby. Chen was driving. Zhang was the passenger. Police said Chen had a firearm when detained. A search of the Honda turned up a second gun.
Filings described by Fox News say three witnesses identified Chen and Zhang as the shooters. Surveillance video, the complaint alleges, captured the couple opening fire “in concert” on McKinsey.
Breitbart reported the shooting happened around 3 p.m. Saturday and carried a witness account first detailed by the San Francisco Chronicle. Assad Razawi said he heard five or six gunshots, saw McKinsey drop, and watched a man and a woman he believed were involved walk away at a normal pace.
Police described the gunfire as showing “blatant disregard for public safety,” noting children were nearby. The complaint language, as reported, also alleged “great violence” and acts showing a “high degree of cruelty, viciousness, or callousness.”
Chen was taken to police headquarters and invoked her Miranda rights. She was booked into Santa Rita Jail on suspicion of murder.
Zhang’s interview went differently. A court document quoted in the Fox News account states: “During a later interview [with] Zhang, he admitted to shooting the victim.”
"During a later interview [with] Zhang, he admitted to shooting the victim,"
Filings further allege he admitted using the second firearm recovered from the Honda. On Wednesday, prosecutors charged both with murder and added the lying-in-wait special circumstance.
The New York Post reported the pair also faced related counts including first-degree murder and felony conspiracy, and said witnesses described them taking turns shooting McKinsey. The Post identified McKinsey as the Times’ head of engineering for games player experience.
McKinsey was a transgender man and a New York Times Games engineering executive. His wife, Candice Jang, the daughter of Zhang and Chen, was locked with him in divorce and custody litigation.
In October 2025, Jang sought a domestic violence restraining order against McKinsey. Two months later, McKinsey filed his own request. The competing matters were headed toward a three-day hearing in December.
McKinsey’s filings, as summarized in prior coverage cited by Fox News and the Mercury News, accused Jang and her parents of years of abuse. He alleged Zhang struck him in the chest while he was recovering from double mastectomy surgery. He also accused Chen of directing anti-LGBTQ slurs at him and one of his children. New York Times reporting cited in the Fox account said McKinsey tied some of the alleged abuse to his gender identity.
Jang made competing claims of domestic violence and child abuse. McKinsey disputed them. None of that family-court record is a proven motive for the parking-lot shooting. It is the documented fight that surrounded the marriage when the gunfire happened.
The New York Post added another layer from McKinsey’s own record: 2025 misdemeanor child-abuse charges after he allegedly hit Jang’s six-year-old son, plus a prior 2018 domestic-violence incident. Those allegations sat inside the same custody war the in-laws are now accused of ending with guns.
Fox News Digital said it reached out to the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office and Dublin Police Services. No detailed public reply beyond the charging narrative was included. McKinsey’s divorce attorney did not immediately respond. It was unclear whether Zhang and Chen had lawyers.
Absolute calendar dates for the Saturday shooting and Wednesday charges were not laid out in the initial account. Exact shot counts beyond “multiple” wounds, full ballistic matches, and Zhang’s complete interview transcript were not published with the first wave of reporting.
What the filings do state is blunt: two armed 77-year-olds, a public lot, an alleged coordinated attack, a special-circumstance lying-in-wait claim, and a father-in-law’s admission that he shot his daughter’s husband.
Murder charges are accusations. A jury or plea will test them. The admission described in court papers, the witness IDs, the video claim, and the guns recovered from the stop are why prosecutors moved as fast as they did.
Family court exists to sort custody, abuse claims, and divorce without bloodshed. When elderly parents answer a domestic war with handguns in a parking lot full of bystanders, the law’s first job is simple: identify the shooters, lock down the evidence, and make the case in open court.
