NATCHEZ — A Natchez couple is dead after a man shot and killed his girlfriend and then killed himself during an argument in their Baton Rouge apartment with their two children as witnesses.

Zachary Washington, 31, shot and killed his girlfriend Shanta Matthews, 33, and then turned the gun on himself just before 11 p.m. Thursday inside their apartment on Lobdell Boulevard.

Sgt. L’Jean McKneely, a spokesman for the Baton Rouge Police Department, said the couple lived together with their two children at Ardendale Oaks Apartments. McKneely said the children were home during the incident.

McKneely said the couple was originally from Natchez and that the couple recently moved into the Baton Rouge apartment. Matthews was working in Baton Rouge, he said.

In 2016, Matthews was the queen of the Krewe of Janus Mardi Gras grand ball. The biography for her royal announcement said Matthews was a 2004 graduate of Natchez High School. She attended Jefferson County Technical School before enrolling at Baton Rouge Community College in business management. She also worked as a store manager for Family Dollar in Baton Rouge.