A New York Times games executive was killed in a daylight burst of gunfire at a California sports complex after two masked attackers allegedly walked up to him in a parking lot and opened fire.
Jonathan McKinsey, 40, was shot Saturday at Dublin Sports Grounds in Dublin, California, where police say his elderly parents-in-law, 77-year-old Shouyong Zhang and 77-year-old Shili Chen, carried out the attack.
McKinsey suffered multiple gunshot wounds and died at the scene.
People who saw the shooting told police two masked attackers approached McKinsey, alternated firing at him and then walked away “calmly,” the California Post reported.
Zhang and Chen were later detained along a roadside after shocked witnesses reportedly got the attention of a nearby police sergeant.
McKinsey had been head of engineering for games player experience at the New York Times since 2023, a company spokesman told the New York Post.
The couple were taken to Alameda County’s Santa Rita Jail and held without bail while facing charges that include murder, felony conspiracy, child endangerment and dangerously firing a gun.
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Investigators have identified Zhang and Chen as McKinsey’s in-laws, but they have not publicly tied the killing to the divorce and custody dispute already underway before his death.
McKinsey filed for divorce last year from Candice Jang, and the former couple were fighting over their three children, ages 3, 5 and 7. They were due back in court this Friday.
Jang sought a restraining order against McKinsey in 2025, and he filed his own request the same year.
In an August custody filing obtained by the California Post and first reported by The Mercury News, Jang portrayed the marriage as one in which she and the children tried to avoid setting McKinsey off.
“During our marriage, the children and I learned to avoid provoking Jonathan lest he became angry. In my experience, appearing agreeable or happy around him was sometimes a means of avoiding his anger,” Jang said.
The custody fight was not the only legal trouble surrounding McKinsey.
Alameda County prosecutors charged him last year with two counts of misdemeanor child abuse, the San Francisco Chronicle reported from court records.
A probable cause declaration cited by the Chronicle says a woman told police McKinsey hit her 6-year-old son in the face with an open hand.
She also brought up an alleged 2018 domestic violence incident, telling investigators McKinsey bruised her left arm by grabbing it.
When deputies went to the home during that earlier incident, they said a 2-year-old child had been left alone in an upstairs bedroom while McKinsey went shopping.
McKinsey denied wrongdoing in both cases and pleaded not guilty. His release on bail required him to complete 12 parenting classes.
McKinsey also made accusations against Jang and her mother in his restraining order filing.
Records obtained by The Mercury News say he claimed Jang tried to pull medical tubes from his body in 2010 while he was transitioning from a woman to a man.
He also accused his mother-in-law of calling him a “disgusting queer” and a “pervert” after an argument over what one of the children was wearing.
McKinsey and Jang had been married since 2011. A neighbor told the San Francisco Chronicle that McKinsey had recently moved out of the home he shared with Jang and their children.
The moments before the parking lot shooting have not been publicly explained.
A police sergeant driving nearby spotted McKinsey on the ground before officers converged on the parking lot.
One witness later described seeing “a man and a woman walking together and casually walk away from the shooting” moments after shots were fired.
The California case came after another alleged in-law killing earlier this year, when a Maryland man was accused of fatally shooting his father-in-law after his wife obtained a protective order and moved their children.
Mark Ryan, 41, was charged with murder in the death of Robert MacMeekin, 74, Baltimore County’s government announced.
In court, prosecutors described Ryan as angry over a temporary protective order his wife had obtained that morning after making domestic abuse claims, according to WBAL.
Ryan allegedly went to MacMeekin’s home in Phoenix, Maryland, carrying a loaded handgun in his pocket and accusing the older man of blocking access to his two sons, ages 2 and 6.
Prosecutors said Ryan fired three times in front of the children, with one shot hitting MacMeekin in the neck.
MacMeekin died at the home, and Ryan was ordered held without bond at the Baltimore County detention center.
Baltimore County authorities described the case as apparently domestic related.
Ryan’s wife and her mother were also there, according to WBFF, and said Ryan dropped the gun after the shooting and “just sat in a chair” until officers arrived.
Ryan’s wife allegedly told investigators that she and her father had gone to law enforcement the previous day to seek the protective order after Ryan hit her and threatened to grab a gun.
She and MacMeekin moved the children to his home, and MacMeekin told Ryan the boys would stay with him for the weekend.
