The perpetrators were five Virgin Islanders, Ishmael LaBeet, Beaumont Gereau, Meral Smith, Warren Ballentine, and Raphael Joseph.
Authorities initially believed the five had committed the execution-style shootings in the course of a robbery gone bad, but later developments suggested that the killing was planned by at least one of the perpetrators.
While recovering from the assault, Kelly wrote the song "Dancing in the Moonlight" to imagine "an alternate reality, the dream of a peaceful and joyful celebration of life.
On 31 December 1984, LaBeet (then calling himself Ismail Muslim Ali) hijacked American Airlines Flight 626 while in federal custody on a transfer to a new place of detention, using a handgun stashed in a lavatory.
With the thawing of Cuban–American relations in 2015, LaBeet was confirmed to be living at large in Cuba following an indeterminate amount of time spent in a Cuban prison.