A quiet evening in Lockport, Louisiana, was shattered on December 26, 2013, leaving a family and a community reeling from a sudden act of violence. Susan 'Pixie' Gouaux, a 61-year-old female, was fatally shot in her home in what would unfold as a multi-parish shooting spree. The tranquility of the holiday season was irrevocably broken when her former son-in-law, Ben Freeman, arrived at her residence.
The first indication of the tragedy came around 6:40 p.m.
when Gouaux's husband, Lafourche Parish Councilman Louis Phillip Gouaux, managed to call 911 to report that he, his wife, and their daughter had been shot. When deputies arrived at their Hyland Drive home, they found Susan Gouaux deceased from gunshot wounds. Her husband and their daughter, Andrea, were also suffering from gunshot injuries and were rushed to University Hospital in New Orleans in critical but stable condition.
The violence did not end there. Approximately 20 minutes after the shooting in Lockport, Freeman drove to a residence in the nearby town of Raceland. There, he shot and killed Milton Bourgeois, the administrator of a local hospital where Freeman had previously been employed. Bourgeois's wife, Ann, was also shot and injured during the attack. The string of violence also included the death of Freeman's current wife, Denise Freeman, who was found deceased in their Houma residence. Authorities believe she was the first victim in the tragic sequence of events.
The search for the suspect, 38-year-old Ben Freeman, concluded when he was discovered deceased inside his vehicle along U.S. Highway 90 in Raceland. Law enforcement officials determined that he had died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Investigations revealed that Freeman was the former husband of another of the Gouauxs' daughters, Jeanne, and that she had previously sought protective orders against him. The motive for the devastating rampage appeared to be rooted in domestic grievances. In the aftermath, the communities of Lockport, Raceland, and Houma were left to mourn the multiple lives lost in a senseless act of violence that turned a holiday evening into a scene of profound tragedy.
