A 22-year-old medicine technician at a Maryland senior living facility has been charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of an 87-year-old resident. Authorities allege the suspect administered medication to the victim before tampering with security sensors and fleeing the scene. The incident occurred at the Cogir Potomac facility in Potomac, Maryland.
On the night of February 13, Maurquise Emillo James, a 22-year-old medicine technician at the Cogir Potomac Senior Living facility in Potomac, Maryland, administered medication to resident Robert Fuller Jr., 87, and his roommate as part of his routine duties, according to police statements.
The next morning, around 7:30 a.m. on February 14, emergency responders arrived for a reported medical emergency and found Fuller unresponsive in his bedroom with a contact gunshot wound to the head. He was pronounced dead at the scene, and the death was ruled a homicide, though no gun was recovered.
Surveillance footage captured an individual—later identified as matching James—entering and exiting the facility via an exterior door around 5:05 a.m. and again about 10 minutes later, before running out of camera view. Investigators discovered the door's alarm sensor had been tampered with and found a small folded paper towel propping it open. The door had last functioned on January 9, the day James was recorded using it, and he was the only person seen leaving through it on camera.
Fuller's roommate reported that James returned later that night to ask if the medication had taken effect, which was unusual behavior. Another employee later spotted James inside the facility after his shift ended, with a door sensor alarm triggered; James fled, and they found a black napkin and a similar paper towel near the door.
James was arrested in downtown Rockville after attempting to flee officers. Earlier, on a Tuesday morning around 3:30 a.m., a Maryland state trooper pulled over a silver Infiniti with no tags in West Baltimore; a man matching James's description fired shots at the trooper, who sustained non-serious injuries. James faces additional charges of attempted murder in that incident.
Fuller, a retired Navy Reserve officer and prominent Maine attorney, was a philanthropist who donated millions in the Pine Tree State before moving to Maryland a few years ago with his wife due to her family ties there.
