Yogurt Shop Murders Solved After 34 Years, Families React

Officers at the scene of the Yogurt Shop murders. American-Statesman 1991 file photo.

After a murder case that went unsolved for 34 years, a technological breakthrough helped solve the 1991 murders of four teenagers who died in an Austin yogurt shop. The four victims of the yogurt shop murders in Austin were teenagers Amy Ayers, Jennifer Harbison, Sarah Harbison, and Eliza Thomas.

On Dec. 6, 1991, the girls were found gagged, shot, and burned inside an I Can't Believe It's Yogurt! shop where Harbison and Thomas worked.

Using a combination of new DNA testing, ballistics examinations and old-fashioned boots-on-the-ground police work, authorities say they are convinced they have linked the crime scene to the killer, who they identify as Robert Eugene Brashers. Authorities across Texas and in multiple other states have now mobilized to see if Brashers, who has already been deemed responsible for three other murders in the 1990s, may have killed others. Brashers died by suicide in 1999 as Missouri police closed in to arrest him for other crimes.

During a Monday morning news conference, family members of the four victims expressed their gratitude for the case finally being solved while also sharing moments of frustration leading up to Monday's update.

(L-R) Fire agent Chuck Meyer w. homicide sgts. John Jones & Mike Huckaby checking out info charts on hood of car at night as they spearhead the investigation of 4 teenage girls shot to death & burned in fire set by the killer at yogurt shop where they worked (Photo by Mark Perlstein/Getty Images)

Leaders with the City of Austin and the Austin Police Department held a press conference on Monday to provide new information about the murder of four girls at the I Can't Believe It's Yogurt! shop in North Austin in 1991. Family members of the four victims had the opportunity to speak.

Here is what family members of the victims said during the conference.

• Barbara Wilson (mother of Sarah and Jennifer Harbison): "Every officer that I see in Austin that has been there for us and loved us and what they have done… people don't understand how hard they work," she said. "Everybody is concerned for the solving of the case. Everybody was concerned about all of us here because they know the tragedy was so painful, and continues to be, but I really just came to say thank you to the Austin Police Department, and all the love and support that you have given us over these 34 years."
• Sonora Thomas (sister of Eliza Thomas): "The outpouring of love from strangers because of these tragic circumstances has taught me about the nature of humanity," Thomas said. "Living through something like this, you would think that I'd feel worse about humanity, but instead, I feel better. When I think about those early days. I think about Nell Meyers, Verna Lee Carr from “People Against Violent Crimes,” coming to our house, taking us out to lunch. They even took me, a 13-year-old girl, shopping. Dawn and Susan Cox from the Christi Center let my mom sleep on the couch when she was too scared to go home. Then there was the memorial company that donated the headstone, and the Lanier student who played Taps at the funeral, and John Jones, who was there from the very beginning who still answers my phone calls."
• Shawn Ayers (family of Amy Ayers): "Thank you to law enforcement officers from local, state and federal law enforcement agencies," Ayers said. "Thank you to all the labs and their employees. Thank you to all the experts that had a hand in this. The results you see today, we have an army of people working together [to] reach a common goal, not for themselves but for the victims and their family."
• Angie Ayers (family of Amy Ayers): "There’s been a great amount of emotion today that no one can explain unless you experienced it," she said. "And to those that leaked it… leaked it before all the family members were notified, shame on you. This has never been a story to us. These families… [This] always been our lives, and we were forced to share it with the world. And the one day that we were trying to cope with it and take a breath, you took that from us. I hope you never have to endure the pain that that caused."