Irene Kay Hudson Coulthurst, 27, was one of eight people killed when the 58-foot seiner Investor was burned off Fish Egg Island near Craig, Alaska. The boat had drifted from the harbor after a birthday dinner for her husband, Mark, and by the morning of September 7, 1982 the vessel lay idle while other boats fished. Flames later consumed the Investor; investigators determined Irene and others had been shot before the fire was set and that none of the victims died of smoke inhalation.

Witnesses reported seeing a young man piloting the Investor in the foggy hours and later using the ship’s skiff, and another person was seen buying gasoline that morning. Former deckhand John Kenneth Peel, seen in Craig over the holiday weekend, was arrested two years later and tried twice—his first trial ended with a deadlocked jury and a 1988 retrial in Juneau resulted in acquittal. No one has been convicted and the murders remain officially unsolved.