NEWARK, N.J.— Authorities say a New Jersey corrections officer was having an affair with the former convict who killed her at a barbecue in Newark early Tuesday before killing himself.

Thirty-seven-year-old Katrina Owens lived in Monmouth Junction with her three children and her husband, who is a sergeant in the state Corrections Department.

Acting Newark Police Director Samuel DeMaio tells the Star-Ledger that Owens was having an affair with the man who killed her, 21-year-old Allen Barron.

As a juvenile, he was an inmate New Jersey Training School in Jamesburg when she was a guard there.

After the shooting early Tuesday, he drove away in Owens’ truck, then killed himself in Richmond.

Owens was one of three people killed in separate shootings in a 45-minute span in Newark early Tuesday.