A teenage girl allegedly fatally shot her mother and wounded her boyfriend until she ran out of bullets and stabbed him.
Julia Grace Egler, 16, was charged with two counts of first-degree murder after admitting to killing the couple seconds after they arrived home, police said.
The confessed killer called 911 and fabricated a story about hiding in his bedroom while an intruder ransacked the home and killed the couple.
Kelley McCollom, 41, and Matthew Szejnrok, 22, were found dead in their Palm Bay, Florida, home on July 6, and Julia’s story is quickly unraveling.
Julia eventually told detectives she killed them because she didn’t like that her mother was dating a much younger man and was “not very accepting of her gender transition,” according to the arrest affidavit.
Police say Julia Grace Egler, 16, admitted to shooting her mother Kelley McCollom, 41, to death with her own gun at their home in Palm Bay, Florida.
Julia also allegedly killed her mother’s boyfriend, Matthew Szejnrok, 22, by shooting and stabbing him when she ran out of bullets. At his request, police said she then shot him in the head.
Authorities said she explained that she stole her mother’s gun and waited in the kitchen with her mother and a knife hidden in her pockets for them to get home around 10:30 p.m.
“Welcome home,” he told them, before allegedly opening fire on his mother with the .38-caliber revolver, shooting her several times until she was dead.
Police say Julia then pointed the gun at Szejnrok as he fled to the bathroom and begged for his life, but she shot him repeatedly anyway.
When the gun ran out of bullets, she allegedly pulled out the kitchen knife and began brutally stabbing him on the bathroom floor.
Szejnrok, mortally wounded and in agony, “essentially asked (Julia) to put him out of his misery,” the affidavit reads.
Julia returned to her mother’s room, loaded another bullet into the revolver and shot him in the head to finish him off, police said.
He then allegedly staged the crime scene to look like a home invasion and called 911 at 12:06 a.m. hysterically crying that his mother had been murdered.
“Welcome home,” he told them, before allegedly opening fire on his mother with the .38-caliber revolver, shooting her several times until she was dead.
Julia told police when they arrived that the intruder entered through the back sliding glass door and she hid inside her bedroom with her pet pitbull.
Some time later, he heard McCollom and Szejnrok returning home, followed by screams and gunshots, he said.
She claimed to have remained hidden in her room for another hour before venturing out and discovering the bodies.
However, police quickly discovered that his story didn’t add up.
First, there was broken glass on one of the victims and on top of the other’s phone, which would not have happened if the intruder had entered first.
They later found the gun just outside Julia’s bedroom window, the blood-stained knife on the bathroom counter, and bloody footprints matching her shoes.
None of the many cameras around the house found any trace of an intruder.
Julia called 911 and allegedly made up a story about hiding in her bedroom while an intruder ransacked the home and killed the couple.
Julia eventually broke down during questioning and confessed to the murder to detectives, the affidavit explained.
Palm Bay Police Lt. Virginia Kilmer said the mother and daughter had had “a lot of disagreements over the past few weeks.”
“Egler cited long-standing conflicts with her mother, including disagreements related to her gender transition, as well as disapproval of her mother’s relationship with Szejnrok, as motives for the crime,” it said.
Julia transitioned from male to female many years earlier, as a child, and appeared as a child on McCollom’s social media pages since at least 2015.
Her posts seemed very supportive of her daughter’s gender identity, always calling her “my daughter” and sharing sweet photos of them together.
Szejnrok was arrested by the West Melbourne Police Department on April 14 and charged with domestic battery.
Police said at the time that he and McCollom were arguing in public when he repeatedly grabbed her.
None of the many cameras around the outside of the house found any trace of an intruder.
Szejnrok was arrested by the West Melbourne Police Department on April 14 and charged with domestic battery against McCollom, but the charges were later dropped.
Prosecutors dropped the charges and he was allowed to return home with McCollom and Julia.
His older brother, Dustin Szejnrok, announced his death in a Facebook post, but did not explain that he was murdered.
“Hi everyone, it’s hard to put into words, but it’s easier to share with those who may not have been contacted,” she wrote.
‘My younger brother, Matthew Szejnrok, has passed away. If we haven’t contacted you, please don’t tell us anything about what happened or how it happened.’
Julia is currently being held in a juvenile detention center, but police said she could be charged as an adult. The investigation is ongoing.
