By TRACY BELL and URIAH A. KISER
Published: May 6, 2008

STAFFORD — The woman who was involved with a man who shot his two children, their mother and then himself was shocked when told of the incident by the media Tuesday afternoon.

Ashley Price, who had recently started dating Aaron Poseidon Jackson, 24, drove up to the Stafford County mobile home park, where she was told of the news.

“Are you kidding me!?” Price said. “Are y’all like joking? He shot hiself?”

The children were identified as Nicole Aaron Jackson, 2, and Aaron Neptune Jackson, 1, and the mother as Latasha Nicole Thomas, 23.

Although the children were rushed to a local hospital, they died as a result of their injuries.

Price said she spent the past weekend with Jackson. She said the two stayed in a hotel on U.S. 17 in south Stafford, drank and snorted more than two grams of cocaine.

Price said she spoke to Jackson around 7 p.m. Monday. He had told her that Thomas, who was living with Jackson, had sold some of his things, including his X-box 360, clothes and other belongings.

Jackson told Price that Thomas had been abusing him and that he told Thomas she had to get out of the mobile home by June.

Neighbors say the victims had lived in the trailer park for less than than six months.

Price said Jackson had been drinking that day and that the last thing he told her was that he was going to jail by the end of the night.

Price said she told him not to be upset and to enjoy his children.

According to the Stafford County Sheriff’s Office, a domestic disturbance 911 call came into the dispatch office about 9:40 p.m. Monday from the Walt Lou Trailer Park in Stafford.

When deputies arrived on the scene, it was too late.

Upon entering the trailer at 4 Walt Way, they discovered an adult male and an adult female dead of apparent gunshot wounds.

They also found the boy and the girl, each shot in the head in their cribs in the bedroom they shared, according to a sheriff’s press release.

According to a preliminary sheriff’s office investigation, Thomas phoned a relative twice during the day asking to be taken from the mobile home because of Jackson physically assaulting her. At around 9:30 p.m., however, she called the relative and told her everything was OK; there was no need to come.

Thomas’ family came to the mobile home anyway, shortly after she made the 911 call. When they arrived at the trailer and knocked at the door, there was no answer, according to the sheriff’s office.

The family then checked with a neighbor, who said that he heard a gun shot coming from the trailer about 10 minutes earlier.

According to the sheriff’s office, Thomas died of a shot to the head from an AK-47-type assault rifle. Aaron Poseidon Jackson died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

According to a sheriff’s report, the department seized a number of guns from the home, including handguns, rifles and a machete, as well as multiple knives.

“He carries a gun with a holster underneath him, but he has a concealed-weapons permit,” Price said.

Price said Jackson always felt the need to protect himself in case he was ever attacked in public.

Pam Newton, a neighbor, said she knew the victims.

“She was a good mother,” said Newton of Thomas. “The kids were happy. They were always waving out of the windows.”

“Our thoughts and prayers go out the victims of this crime,” said Stafford County Sheriff Charles Jett. “There can be no explanation for this horrific and senseless tragedy.”

Tracy Bell and Uriah A. Kiser write for Media General’s Stafford County Sun.