Long Branch, New Jersey lost four members of one family just before midnight on New Year’s Eve, 2017. Eighteen-year-old Stockton University freshman Brittany Kologi was shot and killed in her family’s Wall Street home, along with her parents, Steven and Linda Kologi, and a long-time family friend, Mary Ann Schulz. Two other relatives in the house — Brittany’s grandfather and another brother — escaped unharmed.

Police say the victims were killed with a semi-automatic rifle. Officers took the sole suspect, then 16-year-old Scott Kologi, into custody at the scene without incident. He was charged as an adult with four counts of first-degree murder and a weapons offense; at trial the defense argued severe mental illness while the prosecution presented evidence alleging premeditation, including that the defendant lured his mother upstairs before shooting her and then shot his father, followed by the other victims.

A jury found Scott Kologi guilty on all counts and he received a 150-year state prison sentence. The deaths left the Long Branch community and the Kologi family shattered.