LAUREL, Md. — Christopher Adams said his birthdays in the future will forever be a painful reminder of losing a family member to a shooting.
On his birthday nearly two weeks ago, Christopher Adams said his five-month pregnant sister Latisha Adams was killed when a passenger riding in the same car shot her in the backseat. Her unborn baby son also died.
"It crushed me," Christopher Adams told WUS9. "I felt something wrong and I was up the whole night because I couldn't go to sleep."
Anne Arundel County Police Department said officers responded to the shooting around 11 p.m. in the 3400 block of Laurel Fort Meade Road in Laurel on May 19. They arrived to find Latisha Adams laying on the ground by the vehicle.
Latisha Adams' boyfriend was driving the car while she sat in the front passenger seat, investigators said. The back-seat passenger, identified as 48-year-old Ronald Smith, was holding a loaded handgun when it went off and fired one round through the seat. Smith told police that he accidentally shot Latisha and that he and the boyfriend tried to get her help when the vehicle ran into the median area of the road.
"If it was an accident, he still killed my sister," Christopher Adams said. "Everybody is devastated, and everybody is hurt and we're trying to stay strong."
The family said Latisha Adams would have named her son Lamont. She leaves behind four siblings and two teenage children who her brother has been taking care of.
"Since we were babies, we've been together, so, her not being here this time, it won't feel the same," Christopher Adams added. "I hope there's justice."
Smith is being held at the Anne Arundel County Detention Center with no bail. He faces charges of manslaughter, first-degree assault, reckless endangerment, firearm use in a felony/violent crime, illegal possession of ammunition, handgun in a vehicle and illegal possession of a regulated firearm.
Several witnesses, as well as the suspect, were located at the scene and interviewed in regards to the shooting.
Police said the investigation is "active and fluid" and ask anyone with information to call the Anne Arundel County Homicide Unit at 410-222-4731.