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A woman wanted on murder charges in the fatal shooting of two Virginia Department of Transportation contractors in July has been arrested in North Carolina after about seven weeks on the run, authorities said.
Dennikia Rachelle Boyce, 37, was taken into custody on the morning of Sept. 10 in Scotland Neck, a rural town in northeastern North Carolina, by the U.S. Marshals Service, according to the Virginia State Police. Boyce was arrested on a federal charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.
Authorities said Boyce is also wanted in Virginia on two counts of second-degree murder in the shooting deaths of Rai’Shon Eugene Delarge, 30, and Philip Avery Wilson, 34, both contractors for the Virginia Department of Transportation.
State police responding to a reported shooting at around 9:30 a.m. local time July 24 at a Virginia Department of Transportation equipment yard in Chesterfield County, a suburban county just south of Richmond, found two men suffering from gunshot wounds.
The U.S. Marshals Service, which is working with state police, said Delarge was pronounced dead at the scene and Wilson died later at a local hospital.
“Virginia State Police are working with authorities to extradite Boyce to Virginia to face those charges. The investigation remains ongoing,” state police said in a statement on Sept. 10.
What happened in the fatal Virginia Department of Transportation shooting?
Following the shooting, authorities identified Boyce as the suspect and described the shooting as a case of domestic violence, the Marshals Service said. Boyce is a Virginia resident who had lived in Emporia, a city north of the North Carolina border, for the past three years, according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The complaint also states that she was previously employed by the Virginia Department of Corrections and “separated” from the agency in August 2025.
Boyce fled the scene shortly after the shooting, according to the complaint. The same day, the Chesterfield County General District Court issued warrants charging her with two counts of second-degree murder.
Investigators later tracked Boyce’s movements through surveillance footage, the complaint states. She was seen July 24 at a Walmart store in Ahoskie, North Carolina, and again July 26 at a Sunoco gas station in Conway, North Carolina.
On July 28, authorities located a blue Honda Accord registered to Boyce behind a church in Pendleton, North Carolina, according to the complaint. Investigators said they believed she had fled Virginia and was in North Carolina.
Search for suspect spanned weeks
The incident prompted a weekslong search for Boyce, according to authorities.
The Marshals Service announced on Aug. 7 that it was seeking the public’s help in locating Boyce and offered a reward of up to $10,000 for information leading to her arrest. The agency described her as “armed and dangerous.”
Authorities have not released additional information about Boyce’s arrest. She is currently being held at the Halifax County Detention Center in North Carolina, online inmate records show.