On the evening of April 13, 1975, 43-year-old John Leon Sligh Jr. was killed in a racially motivated shooting spree in Wheaton, Maryland. Sligh, an African-American scientist for the Department of Defense and a businessman, was sitting in a car with his 40-year-old wife, Laureen D. Sligh, when a white man identified as Michael Edward Pearch began firing near the Wheaton Plaza shopping mall.

Pearch’s gunfire killed John Sligh and wounded his wife in both legs; the shooter went on to target other African-Americans that night, killing 52-year-old Connie Stanley and wounding four others before two police officers confronted him and fatally shot him at the scene. Because the shooter was killed, there were no arrests or trials related to these killings. Investigators looked into a possible link between Pearch and the recent disappearance of the Lyon sisters, but found no evidence connecting him to that case.

Did anyone in the Wheaton area at the time remember details about that night or the victims’ lives that could add to the record?