The stereotype among Duke University haters is that it’s a four-year containment unit for assholes. That wasn’t always true in my experience as an undergraduate, but Duke was, in every sense, a rich kids’ school. Especially in the late 1990s, it was full of legacy admits—students whose parents had made big donations to get them either in or off the wait list, kids whose parents were well-connected, so they were too. The year I matriculated, as I remember it, less than 20% of the student body was on any kind of financial aid. (I was part of that 20%; my dad was a local lineman for Alabama Power, and no one in my family had gone to college.) If you weren’t wealthy and weren’t white, navigating Duke was that much harder for you.
Dr. Cerina Wanzer Fairfax, one of my classmates, was neither. I didn’t know her well, but Duke was small—there were maybe 1,700 students in our graduating class—and everyone was required to live on campus the first year, so I knew her by face and reputation. Cerina was a public school grad who didn’t come from money and was on a science-heavy pre-med track.
Like many of us who didn’t come from privilege—and nearly everyone willing to suffer the university’s notoriously brutal organic chem program—she was serious about why she’d come to Duke. She was cerebral, exuding confidence about her plans and intentions. Some people have a clarity of purpose so strong that it’s evident even to their acquaintances.
Justin Fairfax was a year behind us—and if he didn’t have a clarity of purpose, he certainly had a clarity of ambition. Justin and I spent time together working on student projects; he was charming, good-looking, and passionate about everything. He carried himself like a big man on campus, because he was one—at least, as much of one as you could be without being on the basketball team. If you’d asked me in 1999 to name the person from my era at Duke who was most likely to become president of the United States, I would’ve answered without hesitation: Justin Fairfax. He was very intense and tightly wound, as a lot of ambitious people are. At the time, that didn’t seem significant.
Justin and Cerina met at Duke, then got married in 2006. As many of us expected, she got her doctorate in dental surgery, and he ran for office. His career culminated when he was voted lieutenant governor of Virginia—then came crashing down after two women accused Justin of sexual assault, which he denied.
After he left office, he tried desperately and unsuccessfully to re-enter public life. He tried to pick up legal clients, but couldn’t find enough work. He went into debt, isolated himself, and began drinking daily. According to friends, he became obsessed with clearing his name. When the allegations came out, a former acquaintance told me on Bluesky, “That was when he really bared his teeth.”
Two weeks ago, Justin Fairfax shot and killed his wife, then himself, while their teenage children were in their family home. Cerina, known professionally as Dr. Wanzer Fairfax, was running a successful dental practice in Virginia and was in the process of divorcing Justin. Court papers indicate that he had been ordered to move out of the house they shared.