Cops: He Got Away With Murder —Until 2nd in Same Place

July beating death made police revisit December death in same Louisiana apartment
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 15, 2023 11:31 AM CDT
Cops: He Got Away With Murder —Until His 2nd in Same Place
Cedrick Demond Lang   (Baton Rouge Police Department)

When Christina Hobbs was found dead in her Louisiana apartment in December, authorities concluded she'd died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Some seven months later, authorities concluded that the 26-year-old had in fact been murdered only after a man with which she was involved allegedly killed a second woman at the same Baton Rouge apartment. Responding to a July 3 report of a possible overdose, police officers found the body of 42-year-old Rachel Johnson covered in bruises, with eyes that "appeared to have been blackened and swollen shut," an affidavit reads, per ABC News. An autopsy determined she'd died from blunt force trauma. "It appeared as if she was slammed down on the piece of furniture breaking its leg and then beaten," according to the affidavit.

Police arrested 35-year-old Cedrick Lang, who'd reportedly told a neighbor to call 911 before fleeing the Florida Vista Condominiums complex, after a witness claimed to have seen him punching Johnson and overheard him threatening to kill her. It was then that police connected Lang to the Dec. 26 death of Hobbs, a friend of Johnson, in the same apartment. Police aren't saying exactly what led them to conclude Hobbs had been murdered, but the affidavit references reports of physical abuse from three people in relationships with Lang. "We will present all of our evidence when he is in court," a police rep tells WBRZ. For now, Lang is held at East Baton Rouge Parish Prison on two counts of second-degree murder, per ABC. He was booked on the second charge last week, per the Advocate. (More murder stories.)

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