Michael Buskey, a 19-year-old White male from Plymouth, New Hampshire, was found on May 8, 2018, in the woods near his apartment off Texas Hill Road, dead from a single gunshot wound. Investigators quickly determined the manner of death to be suicide, noting the remote, wooded location a short walk from his residence. News accounts from the time consistently describe a scene consistent with self-inflicted injury and a body discovered not far from where he lived.
As detectives reconstructed the hours before the shooting, attention turned to Buskey's roommate, Parker Hogan, then 19. Court records and police affidavits later described a grim sequence: Hogan arrived at the site with a gun, a notebook, and a pen, and he coached Buskey on how to position the weapon, even practicing methods with him. Reporting also recounted that Hogan provided a stick as a means to pull the trigger and, after the fatal shot, wiped his fingerprints from the firearm before leaving.
Hogan was arrested in May 2018 and charged with causing or aiding a suicide, along with multiple counts of falsifying physical evidence. He pleaded not guilty at arraignment, but prosecutors pressed forward, outlining the preparations and the guidance they said he provided in the moments leading up to Buskey's death. A judge later imposed strict bail conditions after violations, keeping Hogan under close supervision while the case moved toward trial.
In 2019, a jury found Hogan guilty of aiding in Buskey's suicide and of falsifying evidence. The verdict hinged on testimony and documents indicating he supplied the implement to actuate the trigger and directed Buskey where to aim. He was subsequently sentenced to a term of incarceration followed by five years of probation, a resolution that prosecutors said acknowledged his role while recognizing the case's unusual and tragic circumstances. Buskey's mother publicly expressed lingering doubts about the suicide ruling, reflecting the profound grief and unanswered questions that remained for the family even after the conviction.
