On an August evening in 1982 in Marrero, Louisiana, 33-year-old Carl J. Cookie Osborne was among five people killed when an armed man burst into the home of his former girlfriend, Sheila Thomas. Also killed were Thomas, their four-year-old daughter Shantell Osborne, and Thomas’s mother and stepfather, Myrtle and Owen Griffin. The family had been gathered at the residence when the shooter opened fire.

The gunman was identified as Leslie Lowenfield. Evidence at trial included testimony that a K-Mart employee sold him the .22 caliber semi-automatic rifle used in the killings the morning of the crime, and that the name Sheila was written on the rifle’s stock in blue ink. A cab driver also testified to transporting Lowenfield to Marrero that day. Lowenfield was indicted on five counts of first-degree murder; at his 1984 trial he was found competent, declined an insanity defense, and the jury convicted him on three counts of first-degree murder and two counts of manslaughter, recommending the death penalty.

Does anyone have memories of the victims or information about the case that could add details about that night or its aftermath?