Copyright © 2000, The Austin American-Statesman
New detail emerges in yogurt shop case
In bail hearing, testimony focuses on what police knew about gun found on suspect in killings
A judge denied a request Wednesday to slash the bail of a suspect in the Austin yogurt shop killings after a hearing at which witnesses gave new details about the handling of the murder investigation.
Defense lawyers argued that new evidence about a supposed murder weapon changes the case, but state District Judge Mike Lynch agreed to only a small cut in Maurice Pierce's bail -- to $700,000 from $750,000. Pierce is unlikely to leave jail soon, lawyers said after the hearing.
Much of the afternoon's testimony focused on when investigators learned that a .22-caliber revolver found on Pierce shortly after the 1991 crime probably was not the weapon used in the killings of four teen-age girls at a North Austin I Can't Believe It's Yogurt store. In May, a federal ballistics report, comparing slugs recovered from the bodies of the four victims to bullets fired from Pierce's gun, found that his pistol probably was not the murder weapon.
But Detective Paul Johnson, an investigator who managed the case, testified Wednesday that he knew much earlier that Pierce's gun might not have been the murder weapon. He said an Austin Police Department ballistics analyst reported conclusions similar to the federal report in January 1999 -- months before officials launched a major reinvestigation of the case that led to the arrests of four suspects, including Pierce, in October.
Johnson said he intended to include the Austin police ballistics analyst's findings in a report but forgot to do so. Prosecutors were shocked when he informed them of this in May after the federal report became public, he said.
Johnson said he also didn't mention the findings at a hearing in November to certify Pierce and another suspect, Forrest Welborn, to stand trial as adults. They were juveniles in 1991.
After the bail hearing, prosecutor Buddy Meyer called the lapse an honest mistake that was documented when later brought to prosecutors' attention.
The gun has been crucial throughout the investigation, originally leading police to Pierce and the three others.
A few days after the slayings, police arrested Pierce for carrying the gun at Northcross Mall. Pierce, then 16, told police the pistol was used by his friend, 15-year-old Forrest Welborn, during the yogurt shop robbery. Both later passed lie detector tests and were dropped as suspects.
Last summer, police zeroed in on Pierce and Welborn and two others who investigators said were with them the day after the killings. Pierce, Robert Springsteen and Michael Scott have been indicted on capital murder charges. Welborn has been charged but not indicted.
Ballistics analysts have not totally ruled out the gun as the murder weapon, but the slugs from the victims' bodies appear to have been fired from a more worn-out gun, Johnson testified Wednesday.
Other than Pierce's pistol, prosecutors have presented no physical evidence linking the suspects to the slayings of Amy Ayers, Eliza Thomas and Sarah and Jennifer Harbison. Results from tests comparing the defendants' hair and blood with evidence found at the crime scene have not been released.
At Wednesday's hearing, Guillermo Gonzalez, Pierce's lawyer, argued that the evidence "is problematic, to say the least," and said the judge who originally set Pierce's bail did not know about the Austin police ballistics report. Prosector Darla Davis argued that Johnson's mistake in not sharing the report "doesn't really change anything."
The judge said he was not persuaded that the new evidence would have changed the minds of grand jurors who indicted Pierce.
After the hearing, Pierce's wife, Kimberli Pierce, said the $50,000 reduction would make no difference. Pierce must pay 10 percent, or $70,000, of his bail to get out on bond, lawyers said.
"He has a family; he has a daughter," Kimberli Pierce said, crying. "He will not run. Innocent people don't run."
Copyright © 2000, The Austin American-Statesman