LINKWOOD, Md. – WBOC has obtained charging documents against a murder suspect that also implicate a former employee of the Dorchester County State’s Attorney’s Office in an investigation into the fatal shooting of a five-year-old girl in Linkwood earlier this month.

According to newly-filed court records, Anthony Harris, 26, of Hurlock, has been charged with first-degree murder and various other counts in connection to the killing of Na’Ryah Adams on Aug. 11.

Lindsay Ewing, 42, of Cambridge, is also charged with felony Accessory After the Fact to First-Degree Murder after investigators say she helped Harris evade justice. Authorities describe Ewing as a former analyst for the Dorchester County State’s Attorney’s Office and say she is currently employed at the office of a Dorchester County criminal defense attorney.

Investigators allege that Ewing was having an affair with Harris and using her access to restricted information to provide non-public details to the suspect.

“Further, there is probable cause to believe that Lindsay Ewing engaged in a calculated and intentional course of conduct to obstruct justice and conspired to destroy evidence related to this murder,” charging documents read.

Hurlock and Linkwood shootings
These police accounts now link Adams’ death to another shooting in Hurlock just hours earlier.

On Aug. 10, Hurlock police were dispatched to Goldrush Lane just before 10 p.m. for a reported shooting. There, they found a 14-year-old boy who had been shot in the back, according to investigators. The teen was taken to Johns Hopkins Children’s Hospital in serious condition.

Hours later, just after 2:15 a.m. on Aug. 11, Maryland State Police arrived at a home on Route 50 in Linkwood on reports of another shooting. A 31-year-old male victim suffered multiple gunshot wounds and was taken to Shock Trauma in Baltimore for treatment of life-threatening injuries, according to police. The victim’s daughter, Na’Ryah Adams, was killed in the gunfire. Police say multiple 9mm and .40 caliber shell casings were found outside the home.

The five-year-old’s family spoke with WBOC shortly after the tragedy, pleading for an end to gun violence.

According to court documents filed on Aug. 25, police say the shooting in Linkwood was in retaliation for the prior shooting in Hurlock. Investigators say that a teenager who lived at the Linkwood home where the fatal shooting occurred has since admitted to being one of the shooters on Gold Rush Lane.

Further investigation, according to charging documents obtained by WBOC, identified Anthony Harris, the uncle of the teen shot in the back in Hurlock, as a possible suspect in the Linkwood shooting.

Anthony Harris
Police say surveillance video from a gas station in Linkwood on Aug. 11 shows a dark colored vehicle “resembling a Jeep SUV” pulling onto the shoulder of Rt. 50 near Adams’ home, turning its headlights off while stopped for about a minute, then fleeing the area just moments before the 911 call came in reporting a shooting. Dashcam footage from a passing truck further revealed that an older model Jeep Grand Cherokee was the only vehicle on the roadway in the area at the time, according to investigators.

Hurlock Police later reported seeing a dark-colored Jeep SUV on Gold Rush Lane about 40 minutes after the Linkwood homicide. The driver of the SUV, Anthony Harris, stopped to speak with a Hurlock officer, according to court documents, before driving towards Douglas Street. Investigators say the Hurlock Police Department’s stationary CCTV also showed a similar vehicle leaving the area of Douglas Street at about 1:40 a.m. on Aug. 11, about half-an-hour before the Linkwood shooting.

Cell phone data obtained by police further corroborated that Harris traveled to Hurlock from Salisbury the evening of Aug. 10, according to charging documents. Prosecutors allege he later left his phone in Hurlock during the Linkwood shooting “in an apparent effort to avoid location tracking.”

On Aug. 14, police searched a home on Douglas Street in Hurlock and Sharen Drive in Salisbury and seized multiple electronic devices including cell phones that authorities say were attributed to Harris. According to investigators, Harris had sent messages to others discouraging them from posting photographs of his vehicle after the Aug. 11 shooting. He also discussed possessing a 9mm gun hours before the incident, police allege.

Prosecutors say the seized phones further revealed on-going communication between Harris and former Dorchester County State’s Attorney’s Office analyst Lindsay Ewing.

Ewing implicated
Police say Harris and Ewing discussed both the shootings in Hurlock and Linkwood the morning after. Numerous messages between the two were deleted from Harris’ phone, according to authorities, but were recovered by forensic software after the phone was seized. Police say the two also communicated via Telegram, which they allege is commonly used to make it difficult for law enforcement to discover.

Investigators say no Telegram messages between Harris and Ewing appear in the seized device’s extraction before Aug. 12.

“I just wanted to make sure you wipe whatever phone they have the number to,” one message allegedly from Ewing and included in charging documents reads. “Also, they know where you work so pay attention to your surroundings.”

Police say further analysis of the stored messages revealed an intimate relationship between the two. The investigation also indicated that Ewing was using sources not available to the general public to supply Harris with information on this and other ongoing investigations in Dorchester County, charging documents allege. One message from Ewing, according to police, referenced a victim in a different, currently-unsolved murder.

Arrest and Charges
Online court records show both Harris and Ewing were arrested on Tuesday, Aug. 25, on the following charges:

Anthony Harris

-Murder – First Degree

-Murder – Second Degree

-Attempted First Degree Murder

-Attempted Second Degree Murder

-Assault – First Degree

-Assault – First Degree

-Assault – Second Degree

-Assault – Second Degree

-Firearm Use in a Felony/Violent Crime

-Altering Physical Evidence

Lindsay Ewing

-Accessory After the Fact to First-Degree Murder

-Altering Physical Evidence

-Conspiracy to Alter Physical Evidence

Harris faces life in prison if convicted of either first-degree murder or attempted first-degree murder alone. Should Ewing be found guilty on all counts, she faces a maximum of 16 years. Both were ordered held without bond on Wednesday, Aug. 26.

Though both will be heard in Dorchester County, the Wicomico County State’s Attorney will prosecute these cases, according to court records.