Kimberly Lynn Coulthurst was 5 when she died on September 7, 1982, aboard the 58-foot fishing vessel Investor near Craig, Alaska. The family had been in port to celebrate Mark Coulthurst’s 28th birthday, returned to the boat for the night, and by morning the vessel lay at anchor near Fish Egg Island. Smoke later rose from the Investor and rescuers found the boat engulfed; the charred remains of eight people were recovered, including Kimberly, her parents Mark and Irene, her brother John, and four teenage deckhands.

Investigators concluded the victims had been shot before someone set the boat on fire. Early leads included witness reports of a young man at the helm as the Investor drifted and a man in the boat’s skiff heading back toward town while the fire burned. Two years after the killings, former deckhand John Kenneth Peel was charged with eight counts of first-degree murder and one count of arson. His first trial ended in a hung jury; a second trial in early 1988 resulted in acquittal on all counts. The state later settled a wrongful-prosecution suit in 1997, and officials have said the criminal file is closed.

Does anyone who lived in Craig or worked on the local fleet recall the Investor arriving on September 5, 1982, or seeing the boat in the fog that night?