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

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[Music] crime 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 techs 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
firefighter's 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 fir but here we have an arson set with the
purpose of covering up the murders and the crimes committed between the times of 11:03 p.m. and 11:48 p.m. 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 was 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 John Benet 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 and 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 you're thinking all this fire
happened after people locked up and went home so what else was found at the scene
well in the process of Prosecuting two of the arrest did for 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 that 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 SS 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 SS was found without clothes and on her side face down near her was an empty cash drawer the medical
exam 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 and 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 SS 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 at 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 SS
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 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 undress yeah obviously though 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 discharged
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 the strangulation feels a little personal to me personable or necessary right so we have one victim that was
that was strangled and but she was also shot twice 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 longtime 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 oh yeah fell fell into our sh 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 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 hel 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 you're a pisser 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 a styrofoam cup into a campfire you 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 in several of
the confessions they say lighter fluid from like like a Zippo can lighter fluid doused 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 lock 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 he said there's over 50 firefighters at the scene nearly 50 I
don't know how many actually went into the store itself it it 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 but at the end of the day if
you're respon 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 tell 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 of these ourselves well 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 access
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 in a teach guitar lessons in the 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 2 or 3 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 or 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 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
belonging so Eliza Thomas arrives at work just before 700 p.m. 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 teexs 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 victim's
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 SS 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 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 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 it 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 did
these attackers take two pairs of the victim's underwear do they take this jacket
for other reasons other than they might have just like the jacket could be some kind of trophy if we if we're talking
about uh serial offender or or otherwise number 11 Amy's bruise under her chin from a blow of some kind so at some 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 SS
so where you're going to have a lot of information about Amy SS that simply due to her proximity to where the fire
started 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 11:03 when somebody hit that no sale button we have the fire being reported at 11:47 p.m. number 12 that
Amy was strangled and 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 [Music] times [Music] this show is sponsored by better help do
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joining us you smell Lov 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 deduce 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 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 invest investigation we are only concerned about the who we are not going to spend
our whole time spending our tires on the why right so but sometimes the why 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 and I think I threw some extra things in there that weren't necessary but you get what
I'm 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 focus on and in 45 minutes we have
sexual assault we have terrorizing the girls we have robbery we also have an arson that 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 a a brilliant IQ criminal criminals I'm sophisticated meaning that they
understand that this fire will destroy evidence that this fire will help this fire will increase the probability and
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 a bigger dingdong 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 gunshot 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 right of those
events no Witnesses burn the place and flee and so I think that the shooting and unfortunately the additional
injuries to Amy airs 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 SS did not die as expected and therefore we end up with
a second gunshot we end up with the stra angulation at some point and we have some of the medical information that
will back that thought up than 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 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 happened 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 SS 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 Gunn 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 and it'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 mhm 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 throughand 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 the 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 right 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 local 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 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 been been able to look 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 or days before I think that they were well aware that this was the type of
location that is secluded is 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 perpetrator 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 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 the 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 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 9:00 the other plac are shutting
down at 10: mhm 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 and you you go and strangely Captain
this case reminds me a lot you know people will think of Los cruus bowl or Los cruus bowling alley that case when
when right 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 Cruz's 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 our 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 in 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 any body 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
home and maybe more personal than people think it would be and also it's such a heinous crime that if there was more
than to 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's the 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 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 reys price I believe her real name is Teresa
or theres price but she goes by Reese 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 7 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
end up working that night to trade shifts right now I'm not trying to paint a picture of anybody came there looking
for ree price and this was the result but you said no manager on staff no manager on duty this is a 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 going nope can't do it here nope you're you're correct if if it's a sexually motivated
crime yeah the other thing that I found interesting too in uh Reese prices 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 ICB store and me and one of the other girls were receiving similar types of calls at our
homes at our residents 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 seat 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 I might got 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 p.m. that night they most likely are the attackers and 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
a back door or 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 Muk and Meer 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 shop 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
airs did not match any of the suspects and to be clear it didn't match any one 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 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 insane 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 on 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 a
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 yst 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
ident 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 Harbison Sarah Harbison
and Amy SS 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 3 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 6 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 person's 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 5 years of existence and all of these horrific crimes and unspeakable
Acts were committed in 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 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 Lowry and this book came out just
shortly before the 25e 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 many more on our website True Crime garage.com and
click on the recommended page and until next week be good be kind and don't live
[Music] you can start your day off right when you find a professional on Angie to get
your plumbing right first connect with skilled professionals to get all your home projects done well
visit angie.com you can do this when you Angie that

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

Part 2 of 2

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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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Brief Summary

The episode details the Austin yogurt shop murders, the crime scene, and the investigation's ongoing challenges and emotional impact.

Key points

Yogurt Shop Crime Scene. Sergeant John Jones describes the yogurt shop crime scene as 'wholesale carnage.'
Gruesome Crime Scene Details. Prosecutor Robert Smith warns that the crime scene details are particularly graphic.
Investigation Challenges. The fire's intensity complicated evidence collection, requiring shovels to sift through debris.
Undressing Victims. Questions arise about the purpose of undressing the victims before the fire was set.
Hold Back Information. The investigation holds back key details to filter out false confessions.
The Significance of the Bomber Jacket. Amy's bomber jacket, once belonging to her brother, symbolizes her transition into adolescence.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Wholesale carnage.

Sergeant John Jones describes the yogurt shop crime scene.

4:06WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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