Yogurt Shop Murders Part 2- Re-release

0:00This episode of Voices for Justice is sponsored by Shopify. I think most people have a dream of starting their own business, but what they don't tell you is that you're going to be wearing a lot of hats and that your to-do list is never-ending and always growing. Finding that right tool that not only helps you out, but simplifies everything can be a game changer. For millions of businesses, that tool is Shopify. They're the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world, like Mattel. They also help you build your online store with hundreds of ready-to-use templates. They can even help you write product descriptions, page headlines, and enhance your product photography.

0:38And marketing, they've got that covered too. You can easily create email and social media campaigns wherever your customers are scrolling or strolling. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Turn your big business idea into with Shopify on your side. Sign up for your$1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com slash justice. Go to shopify.com slash justice. Shopify.com slash justice.

1:11At IKEA, your dreams can come true. Well, maybe not the ones where you're being chased by a monster. We're talking about kitchen dreams. And there are IKEA products and solutions for all of them. Whether it's a whole new kitchen, a statement glassware set, or just new cutlery. If you've got big dreams or small dreams in any size of budget, IKEA can help you bring them to life. Visit Ikea.us slash Dream Kitchen to learn more. Dream the possibility.

1:39Voices for Justice is a podcast that uses adult language and discusses sensitive and potentially triggering topics, including violence, abuse, and murder. This podcast may not be appropriate for younger audiences. All parties are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Some names have been changed or omitted per their request or for safety purposes. Listener discretion is advised. My name is Sarah Turney, and this is Voices for Justice.

2:13Today's episode is part two of my coverage of the 1991 yogurt shop murders from Austin, Texas. So, if you haven't listened to part one, I definitely recommend going back and listening to that first, otherwise this episode won't make a whole lot of sense. In part one, I left you just after the girls' parents were notified of their deaths after they were found deceased in the I Can't Believe It's yogurt shop. In this episode, I will be covering the investigation, a slew of false confessions, and eventual arrests. Because in the next decade or so, there will be a lot of missteps that I think are really important to talk about.

2:50Because, unfortunately, the investigators in this case would not only fail to get justice for the girls, but create more victims in the process through false accusations and, in my opinion, downright dirty police work. Like with part one, we have a lot to cover, so let's get into it. By the time he got the case of the yogurt shop murders, Sergeant John Jones from the Austin Police Department had already dealt with over 150 death investigations. But Jennifer, Eliza, Sarah, and Amy would be his very last four. John Jones didn't always plan to be in law enforcement. He was actually a music education major at the University of Texas when he lost his job waiting tables.

3:33He saw that the Austin Police Department was looking for cadets and applied thinking it would only be temporary. But once he compared the pay and benefits of being a cop versus being a music teacher, he decided to stay on the force. Like I briefly mentioned in the last episode, John Jones was partnered with a more senior officer, Mike Huckabay. The two men had already developed a relationship through working on other cases together, so Jones actually put in a request for Huckabay to be assigned to the yogurt shop murders with him. Both men were fathers of daughters, but above all, they trusted each other.

4:09Jones and Huckabay actually made a pact when they first got the case. They decided that they weren't going to be trigger-happy, they wouldn't make an arrest before they had concrete evidence to make charges stick permanently. Unfortunately, this was not a sentiment that everyone on the team would share. Like I touched on in part one, Huckabay was really known for his negotiation skills. So, it was decided that he would handle all interviews and negotiations while Jones focused on the technical side of things. Despite being a pretty seasoned officer, Huckabay would later admit how hard the case really hit him, stating, quote, I saw things in Vietnam and thought nothing would ever match that.

4:51Well, this matches that because it's in Austin, Texas, right down the street from where we live. End quote. After meeting with arson investigator Melvin Stahl on the night of the murders, they knew that they were in dire need of outside help. Way back in 1991, the Austin Police Department didn't really have a forensic unit. They didn't have people in-house like a ballistics expert or someone to help with blood spatter or hair and fiber analysis. They basically had someone who did fingerprint matching, and that was it. Their only option was the Texas Department of Public Safety's lab. And it, and unfortunately also its staff, were pretty new and inexperienced.

5:32But they sent the head of DNA Operation Irma Rios to the scene. According to her later court testimony, this would be maybe her second arson case. She would also admit that although DPS did provide her with a handbook of all the proper procedures to follow while processing a crime scene like the yogurt shop murders, she wasn't really familiar with them. Another major player in this operation would be Charles Meyer from the ATF National Response Team. He and Jones worked together previously on another arson homicide case. So Jones knew his work, and he also knew that with the ATF, he could get access to a lot of things that he wouldn't be able to otherwise.

6:13This would include the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program, or VICAP for short. If you weren't familiar with this program, it's basically this huge nationwide database for law enforcement that collects and analyzes violent crimes. So someone could plug in things like arson, homicide, sexual assault, and pull up similar cases. That way, they can compare and contrast to see if the perpetrator might have been involved with another similar crime in the past and determine if they had a repeat offender on their hands. This way, they can not only hopefully gather more clues to figure out who they thought did this, but also possibly prevent something like this from happening again in the future.

6:52So basically, it's a very cool and powerful tool, especially for 1991. And Jones really wanted access to it. But unfortunately, the yogurt shop murders would be considered unique, not matching to any other crime in the system. However, in addition to getting access to VICAP, with Charles Meyer from the ATF on board, Jones and Huckabay would also have access to things like polygraph experts, behavioral analysis, and wiretaps. So even though the arson investigator was a little nervous about bringing in a federal agency so quickly, thinking it might kind of upset the team, he gave in to Jones and backed him up on the ask.

7:34And a few hours after Jones' request, they at least had a few more extra officials that they wouldn't have had otherwise to help them analyze this extremely complicated scene. So let's talk about what they found. They were able to recover the.380 shell casing from the pistol used to shoot Amy Ayers for the second time. This was found in a clogged drain near the main sink in the prep area by where Amy was found. After the smoke and steam cleared, they also found a large amount of blood at the scene. This led them to believe that the girls most likely died from their gunshot wounds before the fire was even set.

8:12They also noticed that there was a lot more damage on the items that were closer to the ceiling versus the items that were closer to the ground. Containers on shelves, a mop handle, and even a ladder with its two top steps completely melted off indicated that the fire started above ground level. From there, they believed that it spread across the ceiling of the shop and then down to the ground. And they estimate that the fire reached over 1200 degrees Fahrenheit, or about 650 degrees Celsius. Melvin Stahl's report would confirm that the fire started on that metal shelving unit, the one that was next to Jennifer and the back door, which would correlate with Jennifer having the worst burns.

8:55He would also confirm that it was most likely that Jennifer Harbison's body was originally stacked on top of her sister Sarah and Eliza before somehow rolling off. Like we see in a lot of investigations, there were definitely some missteps. One of the most crucial in my opinion being the fact that they didn't collect as many fingerprints from the scene as they probably should have. The woman in charge of collecting fingerprints was Rachel Reif, and she would later admit that she didn't really dust for fingerprints in all of the areas you might expect people to touch, but instead she pretty much just took the prints that she could see with her naked eye.

9:32The team also failed to wear booties or keep a log of who was coming and going to be able to cross-reference for contamination. And they didn't even go through the trash at the shop. They also improperly stored crime scene evidence and eventually lost quite a few items. The melted I-can't-believe-its-yogurt shop phone would actually be misplaced and later recovered from an Austin Fire Department training center. The metal shelving unit where the fire supposedly originated was wrapped in crime scene tape, but Rios admitted that they actually used it to store other pieces of evidence. This shelving unit, along with the melted ladder and the charred mop and mop bucket, were later moved to an alleyway.

10:13But then, they just seemed to disappear into thin air. And the lock on the back door, the lock that they believe may have been tampered with by the killers, well, that was gone too. Although Irma Rios, the manager of that very new crime lab, was in charge of the chain of custody for these items, she never took full responsibility or could explain how these things happened. This message is sponsored by Greenlight. Money is this invisible thread that ties us all together. It's something everyone has to deal with. That's why teaching kids about money isn't just smart, it's essential. Greenlight is a debit card and money app for families.

10:52It's a safe way to teach kids and teens about money. With Greenlight, parents can send money quickly, get spending notifications, and even assign chores. Greenlight turns responsibility into real-world learning. Kids and teens learn how to save, invest, and build money confidence. Skills that can really make all the difference in their future. If I had Greenlight growing up, maybe I would have learned that money is a tool I could use for my future. Not something to fear or fall for. Not to mention the magic of compounding interest. Give your kids the financial education many of us didn't get. Join millions of parents already using Greenlight, the number one family finance and safety app.

11:32Start your risk-free Greenlight trial today at greenlight.com slash justice. That's greenlight.com slash justice to get started. Greenlight.com slash justice.

11:46It's Hulu-ween on Disney+. Watch frightful family favorites like Hocus Pocus and Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas on Disney+. I am the Pumpkin King! Then take the terror to 10 with a thrilling new remake of The Hand That Rocks the Cradle. Scream and more with Huluween on Disney+. All these and more screaming this Halloween season with Hulu on Disney+. Bundle subscription required. 18+. Select Hulu content via Disney+. Additional content on Hulu app. Terms apply. Visit Disneyplus.com slash Hulu for details. After processing the scene, the medical examiner's office did finally recover the bodies of Jennifer, Sarah, Eliza, and Amy in order for autopsies to be completed.

12:27However, Jones would later state that he's pretty sure that by the time the girls got to Dr. Tommy J. Brown, the man who would perform these autopsies, that he had already heard an earful from Les Carpenter, who, if you don't remember from part one, was the deputy medical examiner in charge while the chief medical examiner was out of town. And after fighting with Jones about performing tests on the girls on the scene, he reluctantly gave in while pretty much just kicking and screaming. So, Jones reports that Dr. Brown was less than friendly when he and Huckabay showed up to his office. And ultimately, both men would blame Les Carpenter for Dr.

13:05Brown doing what they believed was a rushed job. In their opinion, it was just less thorough than other autopsies they'd seen. One major issue was that they weren't even tested for accelerant. This wasn't done on the scene or after the fact. Apparently, the reason for it not being done at the scene was because nobody smelt any type of accelerant. There was no gas, there was no hairspray, there was nothing that would indicate that an accelerant was used. But no one really knows why Dr. Brown didn't perform this test during the autopsies, other than maybe this tiff between the Austin PD and the ME's office.

13:41But the autopsies were able to determine some pretty crucial things about the girls. Sarah Harbison had been sexually assaulted, though they couldn't confirm that it had been done with the ice cream scoop found between her legs. They also recovered two sets of male DNA from Jennifer Harbison. After questioning her boyfriend, it was confirmed that she visited him a few hours before going to work and they had sex. So one set of the male DNA was confirmed to be his, but the other set remains unidentified. It was also confirmed that Amy Ayers was sexually assaulted, and they were able to find a single strand of DNA.

14:19This would be put into CODIS, which was a pretty new system in 1991, but no match was found at the time. By the afternoon after the girls were found, the Austin Police Department decided that in order to maintain the integrity of the investigation and to ensure that they would be able to bring the perpetrator to justice beyond a shadow of a doubt, they held back the following 13 pieces of information about the case from the public. 1. How and where the fire was started. 2. That the key was still in the front door when firefighters arrived. 3. The amount of money taken from the store. 4. The arrangement of the girls' bodies.

14:585. What was used to tie the girls up. 6. The office key was found under the cash register. 7. No one entered the office. 8. Two of the girls' underwear was missing. 9. Both.22 and.380 caliber guns were used in the murders. 10. Amy's brother's leather bomber jacket was missing. 11. The bruise under Amy's chin. 12. That Amy was strangled, and what she was strangled with. 13. That Amy was shot twice with two different guns. Unfortunately, a lot of this privileged information was already getting out around town. People knew that some of the girls' bodies had been stacked, that one girl was shot twice, and they even knew about the ice cream scoop.

15:47On Monday morning, the Austin PD put out a nationwide dispatch to other police departments. This had details of the case, and it asked them to reach out to them if they had any similar crimes in their jurisdictions. And not too long after, the local newspaper, The Statesman, which in my opinion would ultimately be a huge detriment to this case, ran a front page story quoting the investigators talking about details such as what the girls were tied up with, and that the back door of the shop was not locked and the front door was. And on Tuesday, the Austin PD themselves released even more information.

16:23They said that they believed that there were two perpetrators and that Amy Ayers had been shot in the head twice, while the other girls were only shot once in the back of the head. They also released that they believed it was a robbery. These are small details, but it could be the difference between catching the person who did this and a wrongful conviction. which, as I've already mentioned, will become a major issue in this case. And hindsight is 20-20, right? I don't think that the media or the Austin PD were purposely trying to hurt this investigation. I think the city of Austin and their police department had never seen a case like this and they didn't really know what to do.

17:05It's also clear that the city was an absolute wreck over the murders of these four young girls and they were demanding answers. So both the media and the police were trying to give them those answers, not really knowing the damage that they were doing. The residents of Austin were obviously extremely terrified and sad. The Lanier School community, student body, and faculty and staff have been saddened by the tragic deaths of four young ladies for whom we mourn today. They're grieving for their classmates. Three of the victims were students at Lanier High School. Today, the students try to deal with the loss and their pain together.

17:49This is probably the worst, most heinous crime that has happened in the city. Students are encouraged to talk about their feelings. A team of counselors is at the school to help them. There are so many questions and fears now about things many of these teenagers never even thought about. I mean, they died and they were so, you know, they were our age. And, I mean, it makes you really think, you know, tomorrow is a promise. And, I mean, anybody here may not be here tomorrow and it's just scary and it hurts. Me, I mean, you don't ever think anybody's going to come into a yogurt place and shoot you.

18:25I mean, and shoot you and all your friends. It just doesn't happen in a yogurt place. And in addition to the case getting just a huge amount of press, people came out in droves to help with the search for the person that killed these girls. More than a hundred co-workers, friends, and even some who don't know the families of the four girls stood in line waiting for their chance to help. Inside the packets are the tools to canvas the neighborhood near the yogurt shop, keeping the memory of the girls and the crime alive.

19:04For Donna Robinson and her daughter Tracy, there is pain. There's also anger and determination. I hope they realize we're not going to give up until they're found. These high school students are some of the dozens who joined forces at five area malls today. For those who knew the girls, handing out these flyers is part of the healing. It helps just a lot to feel that I'm actually a part of it to help to get captured this person because I want to see these people put behind bars. It seems like almost overnight, the small-town feel of Austin, Texas disappeared as the reality of the murders set in.

19:42There was also a lot of scrutiny on Bryce Foods, the parent company of I Can't Believe It's Yogurt. And their CEO, Bill Bryce, flew from Dallas to meet with the girls' families. and to announce his offer of a$25 ,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the person or people who killed the girls. He also took this time to defend himself, saying that he had hundreds of stores all around the world, including two more stores in the state of Texas. He explained that this shop was no different from the others in terms of who they hired and leaving them alone. He hired a lot of teenage girls, who closed together alone all the time.

20:23And this was their first murder. But eventually, the families would bring a civil suit against Price Foods. And they would ultimately settle out of court for$12 million. On Tuesday, December 10, 1991, there was a funeral held for all four girls. Over 1 ,500 people attended, including the mayor and the chief of police. Jennifer, Sarah, and Amy were buried side-by-side at the Capitol Memorial Gardens, while Eliza was buried closer to her family's home at the Austin Memorial Park Cemetery. All funeral expenses were covered by Bryce Foods. Investigators actually taped the entire ceremony just in case the perpetrators were in the crowd watching.

21:10And they even had officers posted at their graves doing surveillance, just in case. Christmas and New Year's came and went, but on January 3rd, Jones was right back to work. And it was at this time that Jones wrote Police Chief Jim Everett a memo updating him on the investigation and asking him for help. Jones explained that the amount of phone tips had dramatically slowed down, and he discussed his interviews with all known employees and customers that were at the Hillside Strip Mall on the night of the murders. He also informed the chief that the FBI Behavioral Science Unit intended on creating a personality profile of the offenders, and that they suggested going to the media with that profile, specifically Unsolved Mysteries and America's Most Wanted.

21:56Jones then explained that while he appreciated having four patrolmen to aid in the investigation, that he needed four investigators solely dedicated to the case for at least 60 days, or until it was solved. And luckily, Chief Everett totally agreed. And he sanctioned a task force made up of officials from the Austin PD, the Austin Fire Department, the ATF, the FBI, Texas DPS Intelligence, the Travis County Sheriff's Office, and the Travis County DA's office. After a day-long meeting with the FBI Behavioral Science unit, they created that behavioral profile of the perpetrators. And per their recommendation, John Jones did go to the press stating that an arrest was imminent, which of course made the front page of the local newspaper, The Statesman.

22:49By the following Monday, exactly one month after the murders, they held a press conference where John Jones stated that he must have been misquoted about the arrest being imminent. However, he would later admit that this was a lie the FBI instructed him to tell the media, stating, quote, I did what the FBI told me to do, and I got slammed for it, end quote. But after this somewhat embarrassing issue, Jones then released their behavioral profile, stating the following five points. One, more than one person was involved in the murders, and one of them had a dominant personality. Two, they were probably white and in their late teens to mid-twenties.

23:32Three, and this is a long one so stay with me, the perpetrator with the dominant personality probably didn't finish high school and was considered an underachiever with below average grades and a discipline problem. This person probably had an explosive personality and is quick to get angry, especially while under the influence of drugs and alcohol. And they are incredibly impulsive without thinking about the consequences of their actions. They will engage in physical confrontation only when they have the upper hand. But they will not engage in confrontation without their friends present. They are probably unemployed or working a menial job.

24:11They will have a history of changing jobs, isn't a dependable employee, and has a history of being absent. They most likely live with and are dependent on an older person such as a parent. This person is probably very familiar with the area and frequent it often, most likely living in the neighborhood. They probably have a criminal history and are most likely abusive to women. This person most likely has no remorse for killing the victims, but is very anxious because things may not have gone as planned. They are also extremely concerned about their accomplices because they are most likely experiencing a lot of regret.

24:49They theorize that this would create a lot of paranoia between the perpetrators and possibly lead to violence amongst themselves. 4. Although the perpetrators would not have a lot of blood on them, they most likely immediately cleaned up and changed their clothing after the murders. 5. The perpetrators might have returned to the scene of the crime to watch police and fire departments. They may have left town and they may have missed some days of work. This profile would appear as an entire page in the Statesman, with a headline of quote, Many people know this killer. Do you? End quote. By February, Jones and his team were given more office space, more equipment, and more money for overtime to help solve the murders.

25:36Jones would later state that he was essentially given whatever he needed for the investigation, and that no one wanted to be the person that hindered it. They knew the entire world was watching, and they still had a lot of work to do with at least 50 more witnesses to interview. By the end of the month, 12 billboards with the girls' faces and the words who killed these girls were placed strategically around the city. Over time, there would be 20 more put up as the reward money rose to$100 ,000. When it comes to what your family eats and drinks, you know your choices matter. You're the expert because you know what fits your life.