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- 4 men exonerated in infamous 1991 yogurt shop killings (abcnews.com)
Four Men Exonerated in Decades-Old Austin Yogurt Shop Murders
Austin, TX – Decades after their initial arrests and years of legal battles, four men have officially been exonerated in the notorious 1991 quadruple murders at an Austin yogurt shop. The long-awaited declaration of innocence comes months after authorities announced they had identified the true killer in the brutal case.
Michael Scott, Robert Springsteen, Maurice Pierce, and Forest Welborn, who were described by a defense attorney as “normal teenage boys” at the time of the murders, had their “entire youth and futures… taken away from them,” the attorney stated during an emotional hearing on Thursday.
“It is truly a miracle that we are here,” the attorney remarked, adding that this miracle “has come too late for Maurice Pierce and has been denied too long.” Pierce tragically passed away in 2010.
Michael Scott, arrested in 1999, recounted the profound impact of his wrongful conviction in court. He spoke of losing the opportunity to build a life with his family, stating, “When I was finally released, the relationship I once had with my wife just wasn’t there, that ultimately led to our divorce.”
He emphasized carrying the “burden of wrongful conviction” and the “weight of a crime that I did not commit” for decades. “No court ruling can return the years and love that were taken from me, but it can acknowledge the truth,” Scott said.
The horrifying incident in 1991 saw Jennifer Harbison, Sarah Harbison, Eliza Thomas, and Amy Ayers attacked in a yogurt shop. All four girls were shot in the head, left nude and tied, with evidence of sexual assault, according to Austin police. The building was then set ablaze before the perpetrator fled.
Despite a lack of physical evidence linking the four men to the crime, they were arrested in 1999. Springsteen and Scott confessed, later recanting their statements.
Both were convicted of capital murder, but these convictions were later overturned on appeal due to constitutional errors. Before a retrial could commence, advanced DNA analysis pointed to another individual, leading to their release in 2009.
Pierce spent three years in jail before charges were dismissed, and Welborn was charged but never faced trial.
Robert Springsteen, whose statement was read in court, described his life turning into “chaos and uncertainty” after his arrest. “After being released in 2009, I have been persecuted every single day… being seen as a monster for something I did not do,” he shared, detailing 27 years of “persecution, repeated harassment” and a decade spent on death row in solitary confinement.
Forest Welborn, who was just 15 at the time of the murders, expressed through his attorney that he “lost the opportunity to have a relationship or start a family of my own,” and has struggled with maintaining employment and a social life, even experiencing homelessness.
Maurice Pierce’s wife addressed the court, stating, “Maurice never deserved any of this. He deserved life, dignity and justice.
He deserved his innocence.” While grateful the case is finally solved, she lamented that “unfortunately he did not live to see it.”
Judge Dayna Blazey concluded the hearing with a powerful declaration: “No ruling can restore the time taken from you. No judgment can fully remedy the burden that you have carried, but the court can, and does, state without qualification or hesitation that you are cleared and that your innocence is affirmed.”
The identification of the true killer came last year when Austin police detective Daniel Jackson announced that DNA technology had identified Robert Eugene Brashers, who died in 1999, as the perpetrator. Brashers had a history of violence, serving time for shooting a woman and being paroled in 1989 before the yogurt shop murders. DNA evidence has since linked Brashers to multiple “unsolved murders and sexual assaults across the country,” according to Jackson, who noted, “He’s good for sexual assaults and murders throughout the ’90s that he never had to stand trial for.”
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- 4 men exonerated in infamous 1991 yogurt shop killings (abcnews.com)