On October 19, 1978, Daniel E. Wood, 30, was shot and killed during a violent spree in Belleville and Ypsilanti Township, Michigan. The shooter was identified as his former brother-in-law, Billy Edward Hardesty, who had begun killing the previous day when he murdered his parents, Ronald and Jeanette Hardesty. Hardesty arrived at the Stiles-Wood Building, a machine shop in Ypsilanti Township, in the early morning hours and fatally shot Wood; another man at the scene, Tommy Lee Brown, was shot and survived.

The rampage also included the killings of Troy Curry and Timothy Schofield outside a bar in Ypsilanti. A large manhunt ended after a standoff at the Hardesty parents’ home, during which Hardesty was wounded in a gun battle with police and taken into custody. Mental competency hearings followed and he was later convicted on multiple counts related to the killings and assaults and sentenced to life in prison for five murders.