Yogurt Shop Murders - 30 Years Later /// Part 2 /// 540 | Forensic Files

thank you [Music] [Music] thank you welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always we close like Starsky and Hutch here is the captain it's good to
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let's talk some true crime [Music] [Music] thank you when APD Sergeant John Jones was asked
about how he would describe the yogurt shop crime scene he simply said wholesale Carnage
now as to the crime scene and how things were found we're going to review that now but keep in mind the uphill battle
for Crime Scene texts the detectives and the arson investigators this place was a
mess and think back to our trailer at the top of yesterday's show when Sergeant Jones wrote a note to the
district attorney that said robbery plus sexual assault plus multiple child victims plus bondage plus gunshot wounds
plus fire heat smoke water damage plus no known Witnesses equal the homicide arson and DA's worst nightmare put a big
underline Under Fire heat smoke and water damage so obviously smoke heat and fire damage from the fire the fire at
one point getting so hot that the shelving unit melted along with items on it and because of the fire we're also
going to have water damage at the crime scene one from the powerful blast of the
firefighters hoses but compound that with the fire having caused a PVC pipe break which was flooding the store
before the firefighters were on the scene let's also keep in mind that no one arriving to the fire is expecting to
find murdered victims of course unfortunately you have fatal fires but here we have an arson set with the
purpose of covering up the murders and the crimes committed between the times of 1103 pm and 11 48 pm
I have said time and time again Captain how much I hate a situation when emergency services are responding to one
type of call when in all actuality they are in fact responding to a scene where much more has gone down it's always
difficult for the investigators because you often cannot undo the actions taken by those responding to the scene like we
know fire destroys evidence water destroys evidence and it's already a difficult crime scene because it's a
public place there's going to be a lot of evidence that there's multiple people in that building at one point during
that day yes and again the responders responding to one type of call and then finding out something else it always
severely hurts the investigative process some examples Mara Murray they're responding to a broken down vehicle or a
single car accident when this actually was also a missing person possibly abduction possible homicide
yeah or JonBenet Ramsey they're responding to a kidnapping not a murder in the house here we have a fire and a
fire coming from a restaurant they likely have responded to many of these types of calls and other local food
vendors grease fires or the store closes and someone simply left a burner on it happens all of the time here we have
arson to destroy evidence to further cloak the Killer's identities as they flee into the night well like you said
this place is known to close at 11 so when you see that there was a fire and it's almost midnight as First Responders
were thinking all this fire happen after people locked up and went home so what else was found at the scene well in the
process of Prosecuting two of the arrested four the prosecutor went into a lengthy and
graphic description of the crime scene a little warning here I know this is a true crime show but this crime scene is
particularly gruesome prosecutor Robert Smith said the firefighters had to break
down the front door of the store because it was locked with the key still in the
lock he said firefighters could not see into the store because of smoke after the
fire had been put out they discovered Amy Air's body first and then the bodies of the other three girls
Ayers was found lying in the middle section of the store that's his words to be clear this is still the back room but
she is found in the front portion of this back room the other three victims were located at the very back of the
store near the melted shelving unit and the back door Amy Ayers was found without clothes and on her side face
down near her was an empty cash drawer the medical examiner determined her cause of
death to be strangulation and gunshot wounds to the Head a 22 caliber bullet was recovered the other three were found
in the back portion of the store in the back room Sarah Harbison was found gagged with her hands tied behind her
investigators determined that she had been sexually assaulted Smith said her body was extensively burned Eliza Thomas
was found on top of Sarah Harbison in a similar manner her body and face were burned beyond recognition
and she was identified by dental records so do they think accelerant was used on
their bodies no well and that's frankly a difficult question to answer because through through the course of time the
fire investigation and their determinations have changed or been modified let's say over the years so in
the original investigation and I have a good portion to cover this later there was General thought that there was
not much of an accelerant used at all and we'll Circle back to that but we have Smith who said that investigators
believe that Jennifer harbison's body was originally on top of the other two girls however she was found nearby
having been moved either by the fire or the blast of the water hoses and Smith makes it pretty clear to the court that
they believe all the girls were dead before the fires were started the prosecution reasoned that since all had
been shot in the head their bodies were moved and stacked as they were all found
face up but that statement isn't completely clear about the crime scene exactly so what he's referencing here
is the bodies of the three girls that were found at the very back of the store because we know Amy Ayers was found in a
slightly different location she's found face down however the other three girls were found face up leading them to
believe because of the way that they were shot that they had to have been moved after they were shot and killed
because the fire was so intense the crime scene unit had to sift with shovels and screen to find evidence
eventually they found some bullet shells in the corner near the rear door of the
store investigators found a pile of burned clothes included were remnants of denim fabric
and clothing from all of the girls as well as a heart-shaped belt buckle that had belonged to Amy Ayers however police
teams never recovered the belt that went with this belt buckle a ring that belonged to Sarah harbison's boyfriend
was also found so this was a ring that she wore on her finger and she took the time and made the effort to take that
ring off for some reason is what Smith says right Sarah's wallet was also found there again this is another indication I
don't know if there was money in the wallet but just another example of maybe money's not the prime goal here yeah I
mean this case is very confusing because even just like having the victims undress
what's what's the purpose if you know that you're going to start a fire to try to get rid of some evidence what would
be the purpose of having them undress well the other crimes committed that night will dictate the purpose of having
them undressed yeah obviously the guns used to kill the girls was a 22 caliber and a 380 caliber weapon they have never
been found but could be identified by the characteristics left on the discharge bullets so we've not located
these weapons but if they were ever located and tested in comparison to the bullets used to
kill the girls we would be able to determine if it was in fact the match well this
strangulation feels a little personable to me personable or necessary right so we have one victim that was that was
strangled and but she was also shot twice right so what that tells me is there's a chance that
someone may have thought that she was dead when in fact she was not or maybe she put up a fight this is going to lead
us to hold back information so those of you that have listened to this show long time listeners you
already know what hold back information is however if we have anybody a new listener maybe somebody from Texas that
wants to check out our coverage of this case because of the 30-year marker coming up or maybe
just a drunk listener that stumbled onto our show by accident I am fell fell into
our show fell right into the garage hold back information is pretty simple stuff
it's information that only the experts only the law enforcement agency investigating the case and the medical
examiner's office would know you are simply holding on to this information and holding it back from the public
because especially in a high profile crime or high-profile case as is the Austin yogurt shop murders case you will
have false confessions and we will have plenty of them in this case and so it's important to hold back some specific
details so that when those false confessions start coming in you can weed out the persons that did not commit this
crime and we won't go into the psych the psychology of why or who would make a false confession
we pointed that out and went over that quite a bit in our first time around in this case but let's review the hold back
information here Captain this was decided on December 7th so the next day the next afternoon less than 24 hours
after the girls were killed the Austin Police Department decides we are going to make a list and they
created a list of 13 pieces of evidence to be held back and those items were number one how and where the fire was
started but do we know where the fire started the fire has always been a bit of a pisser here in this case here
Captain for seven years we were told well again they're holding back this information but later we
learned that for seven years the arson investigators all agreed that the fire started on the shelves that
shelving unit that melted now this shelving unit is located near where three of the bodies were recovered
but it's always been believed that the fire started like on the second or third shelf
and was started using things that would easily go up in flames right we have like paper products on this shelf we
also have styrofoam products on the shelving unit anybody that's ever been in Cub Scouts and tossed a styrofoam cup
into a campfire you know how quick those babies go up there were also things on this shelving
unit that would have been highly flammable right like paint cans aerosol cans things of that nature right
they're basically using that as their starter when confessions start coming in one thing that I found that was
completely Bizarro is that a lot of the confessions we have people saying that the fire was started on the victims that
they piled up the victims and then put some type of accelerant and several of the confessions they say lighter fluid
from like like a Zippo can lighter fluid douse the that on top of the victims and
then lit them that seems to that narrative seems to have changed right around the time that
they're looking to convict these four individuals that they arrested the next piece of holdback information number two
the key in the front door we've already discussed that how they would put the key in and lock it from the inside
before closing up for the whole night and then leave through that door and then eventually sliding that key back
underneath the door right this is something that would not be known to many people outside of employees of the
icby store number three how much money was taken we can't say for certain how much money was taken we have in our
notes 540 was missing from that night number four how the girls bodies were arranged so the stacking process and
where they would be located inside the store is valuable information because again we're going to have confessions
come forward and they're not going to be able to put the bodies where they were eventually found but when you have so
many First Responders I think you said there was over 50 firefighters at the scene nearly 50 I don't know how many
actually went into the store itself it's a good possibility that some of this information would be leaked out to the
public yes and and it absolutely was and Austin PD admits that over the years that they were aware that somehow some
of this information got out in fact but at the end of the day if you're a response first responder
responding to a what you think is a fire and now you're dealing with four women that were brutally murdered that's
something that weighs on you if you end up telling a couple people because you're struggling with that you know I I
know that it hinders an investigation but these First Responders are human right but there's a lot of information
on this list that won't be obvious to just somebody responding to the fire right and the other thing too here we're
not sitting on this information pretending that only one person knew the answers to all 13 of these right we sit
here 30 years later and don't know the answers to all 13 of these ourselves wow so but we still believe that the killer
does the killer yes then would have known the answers to these questions or the the hold back information number
five what was used to bind the girls number six that the office was not entered that's a very interesting one
because again we have a situation remember that small office has a locked door on it and they were able to
determine that that door was not accessed so yeah a lot and look a lot of these back areas they're not like and I
don't know what kind of door this would have been but like when I used to teach and teach guitar lessons in a strip mall
like those back office we there were chintzy doors I wouldn't take much to break one of those down if the door was
locked you could huff and puff and blow the door down but but I agree with you on the sense that I don't know how much
stealing money or getting money for this crime had much to do with anything the floor safe is in the office right even
if you don't know that a safe is in this office if you take 540 or whatever the amount ended up being from the register
you're probably looking for some more cash the office whether you think there's a
safe in there or not is the place where that additional money would be you would
at the very least access it and look around hell I worked at a place where we had a break in overnight
they couldn't figure out how to open the safe so they removed the whole entire safe they just took it with them right
and it was located like a week or two later about two or three hours away on the side of the highway with the door
missing so people get creative when they're looking for money here we got a couple people that are
offenders that either aren't looking for money or can't fight their way out of a
paper bag number seven the office key was still under the cash register okay again you would need this key unless
you're going to huff and puff and blow that door down you're going to need this key to get into the locked office right
and I cannot imagine a situation where I am holding guns two children and demanding to know where
the money is that one of them doesn't offer up that here's the key to the locked office in the back
office no because it was it was company policy to drop the money at the end of the night it was also
company policy that this is where they would leave their personal belongings so Eliza Thomas arrives at work just before
7 pm and she places all of her personal belongings inside of that locked office to which later the next day when they're
going through the crime scene they find all of her personal items still inside of that office yeah I agree that with a
gun to your head you're not going to hold back that information number eight the caliber of weapons used and we know
that to be a 22 and a 380. of course the the whole city is going to know that guns were used the key here is that they
do not know what calibers were used they also would not know that two different guns were used and this is also
something that the firefighters would not know when responding to the scene right and very likely something that
even crime texts and medical examiners would not know until later in the autopsy process but it's also evidence
that points to more than one attacker yep unless you're double fisted we have more than one killer here number nine
that two pairs of the victims Underpants were missing never found at the scene now I guess it's not too hard to believe
that they may have just gone up in smoke because we have a fire here but it seems
to me like they're pretty thorough about what was found at the scene and what was
not right number 10. this is key man and this is one that has really stuck with me throughout the years
Amy Ayers was missing her leather bomber jacket okay so there's a little bit of a
story here from my understanding this bomber jacket was a men's or a boy's bomber jacket and I believe this
belonged to her older brother at one point but it was like one of her favorite things you know something that
she wore this is also another indication that you know this is a a girl coming up
and she's realizing hey I'm going out with friends on a Friday night and I'm starting to feel like a real teenager
here because I'm doing you know older kids stuff and so while we say money doesn't seem to be of the utmost
importance to these perpetrators one of them went out of their way to take the leather bomber jacket from the scene see
to me that feels personable seems like I mean yeah look it could just be that they fancied that jacket
but to me you start leaning to the towards the idea to these attackers take two pairs of the victim's underwear do
they take this jacket for other reasons other than they might just like the jacket could be some kind of
trophy if we're talking about uh serial offender or or otherwise number 11 Amy's Brews under her chin from a
blow of some kind so at some point she is struck under the chin with either an item or a fist that left a bruise under
her now one thing we need to point out here Captain that's key to this case and to the understanding of the crime scene
itself is the three girls that are found in the very back of the yogurt shop are
significantly more burned charred and damaged than Amy airs so where you're going to have a lot of information about
Amy Ayers that simply due to her proximity to where the fire started right right the fire started in one
location and it spreads through there from it spreads from there well we have First Responders arriving on the scene
probably well not probably it's within minutes of the fire being set we don't know exactly what time the fire was set
but we do know that the place was not on fire at all 1103 when somebody hit that
no sale button we had the fire being reported at 11 47 PM number 12 that Amy was strangled in what she was strangled
with number 13. that Amy was shot twice with two different caliber guns all of our other victims were only shot once
and as we said and as noted in who killed these girls this list will have to be revised several times
foreign [Music] [Music] all right we are back thank you for joining us you smell
lovely cheers so there's so many things about this case that make me wonder like did they
have a plan did these attackers have a plan to take out one of the victims right away
so then they have less victims to try to control possibly and it's it's a sad situation
of course again we will never really know until the proper person is found and locked up or persons or persons
correct however I I think that we can probably to do some things about the the attackers and their actions and their
plan and this is one thing that I thought that has always been another misstep in this
investigation now I want to be clear here and give kudos where it should go and that should go to the Austin PD in
this regard where Austin PD basically said in this investigation we are only concerned about the who we are not going
to spend our whole time spinning our tires up on the Y right so but sometimes the Y leads you to the
who well and when you're sitting here at our position captain in a smelly garage
we have to examine the who what why when and how come I don't think I threw some
extra things in there that weren't necessary but you get that's what our show does we throw in a couple things
that are not necessary yeah so I think here when I review this what I'm seeing is a situation where maybe you're not so
worried about being outnumbered if you are the perpetrator right there's four girls
you're going to be outnumbered unless you have four perpetrators or more the situation that you do have is we have a
lot of terrible things going on in a short period of time so there's a lot of moving parts and pieces within the
course of about 45 minutes is really what I want to focus on and in 45 minutes we have sexual assault we have
terrorizing the girls we have robbery we also have an arson that's set and we have the the perpetrators successfully
fleeing the scene all within about a 45 minute span now what that indicates to me if you're going to set an arson
you're somewhat of a sophisticated criminal and I don't mean people always get this wrong they think oh here Nick
goes calling some Maniac uh a brilliant individual I'm not saying that this was any type of high IQ criminal here or
criminals I'm simply saying criminally sophisticated meaning that they understand that this fire will destroy
evidence that this fire will help this fire will increase the probability and in the likelihood that they are not
caught and so this fire is set for that purpose and that purpose alone well and also
it's when you're calling somebody criminally sophisticated you're basically saying they're they're a
bigger douchebag they're bigger ding dong ass frog you know that's what you're saying it's not a compliment
you're you're putting the individual down that means that this dirt bag thought more about this crime and how
not to get caught the other thing too that the arson indicates to me is that high level of concern of being caught
and getting away with what they did so you're going to want to not be detected and gunshots are loud
and this is a short period of time I don't think that you are using those guns until you have to which would be at
the very end when when you are done doing whatever it is that you set out to do that is what you plan to do at the
end of those events no Witnesses burn the place and flee and so I think that the shooting and
unfortunately the additional injuries two Amy Ayers were items that were not necessarily
planned but were necessary because she did not and I I hate to even say these words but here you go she did not
die when the others did every one of the other girls we shot they died as expected
Amy Ayers did not die as expected and therefore we end up with the second gunshot we end up with the strangulation
at some point and we have some of the medical information that will back that thought up then assuming that the
gunshots happen at different times yes I don't believe for a second that she was
shot at the exact same time with two different guns well not at the exact same time I'm just you're saying that it
could be seconds later though right I mean we're talking the amount I'm not going to go into it because I don't have
the the stomach for it and I don't have the heart to do it but just sit back and
think without forcing me to do this how many horrible crimes happen in a span of just 45 minutes and that's being
that's giving extra time I don't even think they were there that long no and so you know you're you're doing
things very quickly and the science that will back up the thought of her being shot twice and why is simple Amy Ayers
was shot through the back of the head the same with the same 22 caliber gun used on the other girls but in her case
the bullet did not enter the brain right and so I think that is why we have she's
reacting to this and then the killers are reacting to her reaction you know we saw in the Lane Bryant shootings several
people they're all laid down the same way face down on the floor gun to the back of the head and one of them
twitched or moved or something happened and it didn't work it didn't kill one of
them but it killed the rest of them well that's also possible that this could be
a sign that that there was uh soft bullets and meaning that those bullets would have been bullets can become soft
over time and so these bullets could have been older bullets that's possible yes and
the thing here too is a 22 caliber gun is typically used in a situation and I don't I don't want to paint the picture
of of anybody thinking that this is some type of mob hit a 22 caliber gun is typically used in a crime where your
plan is to shoot the individual in the head and kill them with one shot why because most of the time a higher
caliber bullet will do what is called a through and through meaning that it enters the body at some point and it
goes through the body and exits the body at some point with a 22 caliber bullet you want to do
you're looking to do as much internal damage as possible if you want to kill somebody with one bullet so a 22 is
often used because it's not powerful enough in most cases to do a through and through shot it will go into the body
and then it bounces off of a lot of stuff doing a whole lot of damage in the process well I think it makes people
wonder when looking into this case are there separate victims is she separate from them yeah I don't see a
situation here and again we don't know we're kind of guessing here but I don't see a situation that one that there was
even enough time to to do it in this manner that that somebody went out of their way to kill one and then terrorize
the other three or the reverse of that kill the other three and terrorize one for an extended period of time I'm
seeing again they're doing something that's necessary and what's really interesting here is that
we're talking about a difference of a few minutes and I mean this is sad and heartbreaking to think about but the
difference of a couple of minutes could be the time that goes by when they learn
that what killed the other girls didn't kill Amy and so had they not figured that out in that very brief time period
She may have been able to get up and flee and I think that that's what she was in
the process of doing I think she she was crawling away from the other bodies I think she was shot originally in the
very same Locale as the other three girls and at some point she's reacting to the situation and crawled away or
started to flee somehow mustered up the strength to try to get away and unfortunately our killers are still in
that room or still present and have the awareness to see her reaction well it's also confusing
because like you said law enforcement is not going to sit around and try to figure out the why but maybe they're not
going to try to sit around and figure out the why because it seems very confusing in this case you have money
left behind so you have a room that they didn't even go into which has a safe you would think that if they had much
knowledge of this business at all that they wouldn't have left that bag of money behind nor would they leave that
safe behind so what was successful in killing the other girls and was attempted on Amy is what is called a
contact gunshot wound this is where there is evidence that proves that the gun was
right next to or up against the skin right at the time that the gun is fired do you have a gut feeling yourself
because you know this is the second time that we've we've been able to look it into this
case do you have a gut feeling as to motive or or why unfortunately I think the motive
here was sexual assault and probably multiple sexual assaults that's what I lean
towards as well it would not surprise me if these perpetrators were previously in
the yogurt shop and that could be earlier that day or could be the week before days before
I think that they were well aware that this was the type of location that is secluded it's a weird word to use
being that it's a public place but it's secluded as soon as those doors are locked for the night as soon as you turn
that key on on that front door nobody's coming in and I think that this is a situation
where they could have either the perpetrators stumbled upon an ideal situation for what it was that they
wanted to do or they came there knowing or expecting to find that and that might
mean that they scouted this location in advance the other thing too when you go all right well maybe they stumbled onto
a location in a situation that was ideal for what they wanted to do you wonder where else they went that day and night
looking for the ideal situation you know did they walk down to Mr gaddy's and go you know what there's too many
males in here there's too many employees working all at once let's try a different spot
yeah or it could be it could be a situation where the look I think this is possibly coming from a local individual
and somebody that's been there multiple times around closing time and went they're they're having high
school girls close up the shop this there's no there's no manager on a staff and on like you said seclusion
sounds strange like you said because it's a public place but first of all the the major places around there are
shutting down at nine o'clock the other places are shutting down at 10. so now that gives you a whole hour that if you
are from that area you know that place is one of the only places open past 10. so now that that's how it makes it even
more secluded and it's a yogurt shop there's some sometimes when you go into a yogurt shop or the last couple times
I've gone into ice cream shop you're the only customer in there you get your ice
cream and you and you you go and strangely Captain this case reminds me a lot you know people think of Las Cruces
Bowl or Las Cruces bowling alley that case when when Bray when you review Austin
yogurt shop case and yes there's a lot of similarities and I'm not and I'm not here sitting pretending that they were
perpetrated by the same individuals in Las Cruces Bowl we have a pretty good description of those who the two men
that carried out that crime but they are similar situations what I like in this crime too and if I were to
be air quotes here profiling are offenders and I think I I'm of the belief that you
are that we're looking at two people possibly three I cannot look at the evidence at the scene and believe that
one person carried this out I think that it gets difficult to go much higher than
three as far as the number of perpetrators but this crime reminds me a lot of the Cheshire murders where we
have two individuals that are going into a home they know what to expect they know who they think will be inside of
this home and they sexually assault they murder and they attempt to burn down the place
and once caught they're going to try to sell it to the public that oh we were just there to rob
the family and things got out of control things got out of hand we panicked and then we
ended up killing three of the four family members and setting the place on fire what I would be looking for and you
don't want to I don't I'm all for profiling and I'm a big fan of it I guess you would say uh it sounds like a
really terrible choice of words but you don't you don't want your theory or your thought process to
to put blinders on you in the course of your investigation but over the course of years when you don't have the answers
and you've not arrested someone you've not locked anybody up that sticks you got I think you got to start using those
methods and what I would have been looking for is probably two individuals that were recently released from prison
and probably individuals that have committed similar types of crimes in the past and what I
mean by that is probably not murder but I'm probably looking for somebody one or
two individuals with sexual assault cases one or two individuals with robbery cases maybe one of them's a
robber one of them's sexually assaulted in the past that's kind of where what my
gut tells me to me it looks like a crime of not just Opportunity by the perpetrators but also a crime that they
were they were looking to go out and do something maybe not of this magnitude but something horrific in nature we've
talked about this before you know with Bundy and other types of individuals that that some of these acts they become
addicted to it and I think what I'm seeing here is somebody that needed to do this for whatever reason as
disgusting as that is to say well my gut feeling tells me that there was two attackers
but I also think that it's possibly a local somebody that was making those threatening phone calls or those prank
calls I think it's closer to Holmen maybe more personable than people think it would be and also it's such a heinous
crime that if there's more than two attackers I think somebody would have told Somebody by now somebody would
have confessed yes and that that's traditionally how it works the more perpetrators you have of a crime the
higher probability that one of them at some point tells somebody right I mean it's just it's just math
baby garage math and the thing is people do it because it either weighs on their
conscience or they get drunk and tell somebody or they they tell somebody in a threatening manner but yeah the number
of perpetrators the higher that goes up the higher your probability goes up that
one of them tells somebody and my guess is that at least one of these individuals is
currently in prison on rape charges yeah and here thing that I would really like
to know with that we talked about that DNA evidence that the FBI has they've got a match or some kind of hit on it
and and I don't fully understand it and not going to pretend to but um I would really like to know where
exactly that they got their hit I do want to touch on something Captain before we get too far along here that
you had referenced earlier um one interesting tidbit that I found along the way in my research for this
week's case is that a woman by the name of Rhys price I believe her real name is
Teresa or Therese price but she goes by Rhys price at the time of the yogurt shop murders she was 24 years old she
was a manager that worked at that icby store for seven years the thing that I find interesting here is that she was
actually scheduled to work that night and a week or so in advance had made arrangements with one of the girls that
ended up working that night to trade shifts right now I'm not trying to paint a picture of anybody came there looking
for Reese price and this was the result but you said no manager on staff no manager on duty this is uh you know and
I said an ideal situation for what it is that I believe they were looking to do a 24 year old woman being the manager
at this store doesn't change if you're scouting this location I don't think that changes you from two
17 year olds to go on nope can't do it here nope you're you're correct if it's a sexually motivated crime yeah the
other thing that I found interesting too in uh Rhys Price's involvement with the
Austin PD she was God bless her she was very helpful to their investigation and helped in any way possible that she
possibly could one thing that that she passed along to the detectives was she said you know me
and one of the other girls we were receiving harassing phone calls at the icby store and me and one of the
other girls were receiving similar types of calls at our homes at our residence and she had even told them that there
was a situation where she thought that she was hearing some noises when she was working one
night and she thought that the noises were coming from the roof that's creepy she goes into the men's restroom
remember they got to clean up before they leave at night and she says later in the men's restroom of that icby store
that she found a ceiling tile that had been moved and on the toilet seat found Footprints or shoe prints on the
toilet scene that's a weird way to take a dump she's telling police that it's her opinion that the noises
that she heard was someone coming through the ceiling and dropping down into the
back part of their store her belief is that again this is like a strip Plaza it's her belief that you
could access the icby store via ceiling from the connecting stores this is something we we don't have to
put a lot of thought in it it's not a theory that we have to circle underline and go crazy about but it's something to
consider and it's an interesting piece of this investigation and it's interesting information that was passed
along to the detectives yeah my gut feeling is there's a lot more to this not not only are they getting
threatening calls at work but the individuals that are making those threatening calls to the two girls then
figure out where they live and they start making calls to their house that lead those things should be taken
very serious interestingly enough here Captain one thing that I find completely fascinating and I think that we sit here
and probably share the same belief today 30 years later is the prevailing theory in the Austin
yogurt shop murders case and that prevailing Theory seems to be that whomever those two men were sitting at
that booth at 10 47 PM that night they most likely are the attackers in The Killers now I
say most likely because we can't say it definitively what we do know is this that it took several months which is
kind of weird to me but it took several months for customers to come forward and
say hey I was this person I purchased this that night and I was in there about this time and this is what I think that
I saw or heard while I was there it did take a you know weeks and months to collect all those people and police
were actively reminding the public hey we need you to come in here and tell us we it's very important this is their
words quote it's very important that they come forward we consider any knowledge from anyone who was in that
shop before closing to be very valuable police ask anyone with information to call and they give their local police
number but when we talk about these two individuals sitting at that Booth it's my understanding captain that those are
the only two individuals that have never come forward these are the only two people that we know to have been in the
store that night based off of customer testimonials that have not been identified right it could be and it is
possible that these two individuals were from out of town they were just there like every other customer with no
harmful intentions at all and they left before the store closed and they're not from the area and months went by and
they they just never came forward or didn't do not remember being there on the night that was in question that is a
possibility I think it's awfully slim but it certainly is a possibility if we rule that out then we have to say these
are these two are probably the killers and again I think it's more likely that it's two killers and not just oh we're
going to be in the store with the potential of being seen by other individuals and then once they lock the doors we're
going to then open the back door open up the front door to let another person in
the only people ever convicted in this case were the two individuals that eventually
were released from prison and they were convicted based off of their confessions
and we could go through that but I don't think that we should because you can listen to episodes 81 and 82 where we go
through that muckenmeyer quite a bit at the end Captain what we have is of the four boys that were arrested two
convicted the guns did not match right it was a 22 caliber gun that led them that led Austin PD to these boys
their 22 caliber gun they ran ballistics on it it does not match up with the 22 that was used at the yogurt shot murder
so the guns didn't match and the DNA didn't match years after the murders Advanced DNA testing revealed a
bombshell the bombshell that that nobody wanted we were happy when two people were locked up for this case but those
results showed that DNA that was found on Amy Ayers did not match any of the suspects and to be clear
it didn't match anyone in any National Database so yeah the two that were convicted
the DNA that was found on our victim does not match the two that was convicted it also does not match the two
that weren't convicted the two that were arrested and the charges were dropped right by the grand jury because they
didn't believe that they had enough evidence here so but also with such a horrible crime
like this is truly done by demons how many it's surprising to me how many confessions they have got
yes and you know Austin Police they readily admit that over 50 people approximately over 50 people was passing
yeah have confessed to this now I want to address something real quick here if you look at Wikipedia there's an entry
that says that one of the confessions included Kenneth McDuff who's an individual that we covered extensively
in episodes 81 and 82. he's a serial killer there's no question about that here's where the question comes
according to that Wikipedia entry Kenneth McDuff on the day of his execution confessed to the yogurt shop
murders I've looked High and was left dry my friend could not find any credible publication or person stating
that they heard him or right heard the confession heard this confession yes he did have some some last words but they
did not include anything about this case or what I could find any other case now
he's certainly capable of committing such horrific acts but again review episodes 81 and 82 we go into why we
don't believe that he is our guy so then the question becomes FBI has this DNA why aren't they releasing it I mean they
do they just not have a match does it match somebody with a high profile is it does it match somebody that they have no
evidence against other than this this DNA match wouldn't that be enough well I'm glad that you brought that up
because let's review that real quickly here again in 2017 another potential breakthrough emerged
an Austin detective submitted DNA evidence found in one of the victims into a database that searches why Str
DNA samples a type of DNA profile that forensic investigators use to identify male relatives of suspects
a match was found the Austin Police Department requested more information about the identity of the matching donor
but the FBI has refused to release any information saying a federal statute so it's the federal statute that
prohibits it from disclosing identities of anonymous donors so I want to know more about what is an anonymous
donor right and I want I want to learn the ins and outs of that right despite these hurdles the families have
continued to work to keep the case in the Forefront their efforts have led to new crime fighting initiatives at the
state and federal levels again citing that same article according to that article that we cited at the top
of yesterday's show there are over 19 000 unsolved homicides in Texas Eliza Thomas Jennifer harveson Sarah
Harbison and Amy Ayers are four of those unsolved homicide cases when we talk about the yogurt shop case 30 years
later we need to make sure that we include some of the good stuff that happened in the story I'm talking about
the Austin Community and the friends of the four girls that made a promise to Eliza Jennifer Sarah and Amy and their
families and the promise was we will not forget on February 27th of 1992 just three
months after the murders local celebrities recorded a song titled we will not forget written by local
musicians and dedicated to the four slain girls all proceeds from the song were donated
to a fund that was set up to help solve the case on June 6th of 1992 six months after the
murders the classmates of the girls at the high school set up empty chairs for Eliza and Jennifer who would have
graduated on that day the great City of Austin Texas made a commitment to these four girls their families the community
and the persons responsible that they will not forget and in the garage we refuse to forget these girls as well now
it seems that the FBI has the power to help thousands of people heal even if it's just a little bit and I understand
that there are laws and regulations that are needed to protect the people but here those laws and regulations are
protecting the wrong people take a look at these crimes these are some of the most horrific and unspeakable acts that
we have ever discussed on this show and it's five years of existence and all of these horrific crimes and unspeakable
Acts were committed and no more than a short 45-minute time period the People Protected by these laws and regulations
are not people at all they are the very worst of what Humanity has to offer foreign
thanks for joining us here each and every week in the garage if you're digging the music for the show check it
out for free on Spotify Amazon music or apple music it's free so check it out Colonel do we have any recommended
reading for the listeners this week this week Captain we are recommending what I
believe is the definitive book on the case that we covered this week the yogurt shop murders and this book is
called who killed These Girls by Beverly Lowery and this book came out just shortly before the 25 year marker for
this case and covers the murders all the countless lives that this story has really ruined and the evolving
complications of the justice system that have frustrated the massive attempts for
all these years now to find and punish those who committed this horrible horrible Crime Check out who killed
These Girls by Beverly Lowry you can find that great title and and many more on our website truecrime garage.com and
click on the recommended page and until next week be good be kind and don't listen
[Music] foreign

Yogurt Shop Murders - 30 Years Later /// Part 2 /// 540

Part 2 of 2 www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

This week we take a good solid look at a case that has weighed heavy on the hearts and minds of everyone in the Lone Star state’s capital city. The Austin Yogurt Shop Murders is one of most infamous cases in Texas history. Despite the efforts of the APD it remains unsolved thirty years later. Join us as we discuss the facts of the case and the timeline.

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Garage Grade - 4 and a half bottle caps out of 5

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Brief Summary

The episode covers the brutal Austin yogurt shop murders, detailing the crime scene, investigation challenges, and community efforts for justice.

Key points

Wholesale Carnage. Sergeant John Jones describes the yogurt shop crime scene as 'wholesale carnage.'
The Confusing Case. The investigation into the yogurt shop murders presents numerous complexities and unanswered questions.
Missing Evidence. Two pairs of the victims' underpants were never found at the scene, raising questions.
The Attack Plan. Did the attackers have a strategy to control the victims?
A Disturbing Discovery. A manager's shift swap leads to a tragic outcome.
Creepy Phone Calls. The victims received harassing calls prior to the attack.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It's always difficult for the investigators.

Discussion on the challenges faced by responders at crime scenes.

4:46WatchNov 1, 2022

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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