‘The Yogurt Shop Murders’ director's stomach-turning interview with serial killer's daughter
Warning: This article contains discussion of rape which some readers may find distressing.
The director of The Yogurt Shop Murders has opened up about the harrowing interview with the daughter of a serial killer.
Margaret Brown directed the HBO docuseries which looked at a cold case dating all the way back to 1991.
This was the horrifying rape and murders of Jennifer and Sarah Harbison, who were sisters, as well as teenagers Amy Ayers and Eliza Thomas.
Advert
Two of the victims, Eliza and Jennifer, were 17 years old, and were working in the shop, while Sarah was 15 and Amy was 13.
The fourth episode of the documentary aired on 27 September 2025, and just a month later Austin police said that they had finally cracked the case after nearly 25 years.
After a renewed investigation, it emerged that the man responsible for these awful crimes was Robert Eugene Brashers.
On 6 December 1991, Brashers had murdered the four teenagers at shop called 'I Can't Believe It's Yogurt' in Austin in the US before setting the building interior and the bodies on fire.
Brashers died in 1999 during a standoff with police, and was also responsible for the killing of four other people, meaning he murdered eight people in total.
Four teenagers, Forrest Welborn, Maurice Pierce, Robert Springsteen, and Michael Scott, who had been wrongly accused of the crime have since been formally exonerated.
Following the revelation of Brashers' guilt, Brown sat down with the families of the victims for a fifth episode in the series.
And in a shocking moment, she was even able to sit down with the daughter of Brashers, Deborah, in what Brown described as the 'craziest' interview she had ever done.
Asked how she had managed to secure such a difficult interview, Brown told Variety: "She wanted to apologize, because she feels like someone in her family should say sorry to the families."
And the interview had a profound impact even on Brown, who had already seen a lot in the course of her investigation.
"It was the craziest interview I’ve ever done in my entire life," she said.
"I thought I was going to throw up. That woman has been through so much."
Over the previous episodes, Brown and her team had managed to find original interrogation footage of the four boys who had been wrongfully accused of the crime.
She also spent some three years speaking to the teams who had been investigating the crime, as well as the families of the girls who were murdered.
Despite having spoken to them before, Brown admitted that she was 'scared' to go back after hearing the news that the killer's identity had been discovered.
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this article and wish to speak to someone in confidence, contact the Rape Crisis England and Wales helpline on 0808 500 222, available 24/7. If you are currently in danger or need urgent medical attention, you should call 999.
Kit Roberts