Samuel Tague, an 18-year-old white man from Belle Chasse, Louisiana, was a student at Belle Chasse High School. His life was cut short on a spring evening in 2025 when he was fatally shot during a robbery in Marrero.
On the evening of April 15, 2025, around 5:30 p.m., Tague approached a vehicle in the 5000 block of Fourth Street. He knew at least one of the people inside and stepped out of his own vehicle to speak with them.
According to investigators with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, another person in the car, Cashmere Butler, told a witness that he intended to rob Tague. Butler, who was reportedly wearing a ski mask, then walked with Tague around a corner. There, authorities say, Butler shoved Tague against a wall, pointed a pistol at him, and shot him once in the abdomen. The assailant then took Tague's cellphone and gun before running away.
Emergency services transported Tague to University Medical Center, but he did not survive his injuries. The Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office launched a homicide investigation and quickly identified a suspect. The following day, on April 16, authorities arrested 17-year-old Cashmere Butler of Harvey. During their investigation, police recovered Samuel Tague's stolen gun from Butler's home.
Butler was initially booked with first-degree murder and obstruction of justice. A Jefferson Parish grand jury later handed up an indictment charging Butler, by then 18 years old, with second-degree murder and obstruction of justice. As of August 2025, Butler was being held at the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center in Gretna with bail set at $750,000, awaiting his arraignment.
