CHAPTER 39
Thursday, September 9, 1999
Interview Room # 2
Austin Police Department
9:08
A.M.
Michael Scott entered the tiny interview room in the APD headquarters. He stood and looked at the sparse furnishings in the room. There was a small round table with a laptop computer on top of it, three small plastic chairs, and one wastebasket. The room was box-shaped with only one door and no windows.
Scott sauntered over to the chair against the wall farthest away from the door and sat down. He casually tossed his pack of cigarettes on the table. After a minute, he hopped up and walked over to the table to look at the laptop. The lanky, ponytailed Scott sat back down.
Eight minutes later, Detectives Ron Lara and John Hardesty entered the room. Both men were members of the newly revamped yogurt shop task force. Lara, the younger of the two, was a handsome man, with a thatch of jet-black hair. Hardesty, the older, seasoned veteran, sported a silver crew cut circa 1950s military. Lara, a twelve-year veteran, was a member of the Austin Police Department Cold Case Unit at the time. Hardesty, also a twelve-year veteran, was a detective in the APD homicide division.
When Hardesty and Lara entered the room, they laughed comfortably with Michael Scott. Once the pleasantries were out of the way, Lara and Hardesty got down to business. They asked Scott about his youth. He told them that he was born in Micronesia. His father was stationed there as part of the U.S. Coast Guard. Scott spoke of how his father met his mother on the island, how they married, and how his father adopted him. He spoke about the nuclear testing conducted on the island and how his father fought in military battles.
Scott informed the officers that his father was stationed in the United States. Once in the States, the Scotts bounced around from one military town to another. Michael was shuffled in and out of schools on a constant basis. He claimed he attended at least five or six elementary schools alone.
Scott described his wayward youth to the officers. He stated that he “was a problem child” as he got older. He talked about being arrested on The Drag, the strip of stores that line Guadalupe Drive on the opposite side of the street from the University of Texas, for possession of mushrooms. He also talked about his scholastic difficulties. Despite being very intelligent, Scott “was not a real attentive student.” He eventually dropped out of McCallum High School at the age of eighteen because it was too boring.
After he dropped out of high school, he moved to Dallas, Texas, where he got a job as a roofer. After a few months there, he packed up his meager belongings and headed north for Evansville, Indiana. He worked a variety of odd jobs, about four or five of them, before he came back to Texas.
“I don’t know what else I can tell you,” Scott told the detectives at 9:23
A.M.
The two detectives mainly sat back and let Scott speak. Both men were calm and congenial.
Scott spoke of his current station in life. He and his wife, Jeannine, known as “Neen,” and their daughter, Jasmine, had recently moved back to Austin from San Antonio, Texas. Scott had worked as a foreman at a mechanic’s shop in San Antonio. He made $5 an hour. His wife, however, made good money as a field technician at Unisys, “a worldwide information technology services and solutions company,” according to the company Web site. Jeannine received an offer to relocate from San Antonio to Austin with Unisys for a $10,000-a-year raise.
Just over an hour into the interview, Scott told the officers that “I have a piss-poor memory.” About a minute later, Lara placed photographs of the four girls on the table in front of Scott.
“They plugged the crap out of that,” Scott stated as he looked at the photographs.
Lara asked Scott if he remembered what he had done on the day the girls were murdered. Scott replied that he had been hanging out at the condominium where he was staying with his buddy Robert Springsteen. The condo was owned by Karen Huntley, Robert’s father’s girlfriend. She owned two condominiums at the Dry Creek Estates on Dry Creek Drive, directly off Highway 2222. The condos had a gated swimming pool and sauna in front and a large backyard that led downhill to a dry creek. Robert’s father and Karen lived in one condo and Robert lived in the condo next to it. Scott moved in with Robert IV a few months earlier because he did not see eye to eye with his mother.
Scott stated that during the midmorning of December 6, 1991, he was “smoking grass.”
He talked to the officers about his roommate, Robert Springsteen. “Robert used to be in a gang. Blue Bandana. He was the only white guy in this group. The rest of them were black.
“He may have been involved in the Crips.
“He was a good friend until he stole from me. He stole some concert tickets from me. Metallica. Dad worked at the Erwin Center at the time.” The Frank Erwin Center is a large, drum-shaped building on Red River Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, just off Interstate 35, next to the University of Texas campus. It is home to the University of Texas’s men’s and women’s college basketball teams, as well as the premier venue for large-scale musical acts from country, rock, and more.
“He better pray to God I don’t catch up with him,” Scott threatened.
“Robert and I were kind of the potheads,” he continued. “Forrest would come over . . . every once in a while, he’d show up there. We’d smoke out a little bit.”
Scott returned to the discussion of December 6. He claimed he rode the city bus to the mall around noon. His story soon changed as he claimed he got to the mall in Maurice Pierce’s car. It was actually Maurice’s father’s 1982 or 1983 Ford LTD. According to Scott, Maurice would steal his dad’s car and they would go tooling around in it.
“I remember riding in the car to Northcross Mall,” Scott recalled. “I smoked a couple of times that day. I remember going to the bowling alley.” He referred to Dart Bowl, which is located directly across the street from McCallum High School.
“We went to the bowling alley because we both had the munchies.” Scott snickered. While Scott and Springsteen hung out at the bowling alley, Welborn went back to class and Pierce had to run some errands. The two juvenile delinquents stayed at the bowling alley until almost 3:00
P.M.
They spotted Springsteen’s girlfriend, Kelly Hannah, across the street.
Scott did not speak highly of Hannah. He claimed that she was not that great-looking and Springsteen “would screw anything that moved—or didn’t move, for that matter.” He chuckled. The three stood around and chatted for about half an hour, until Pierce came around and picked up the guys.
At 9:54
A.M.
, during the interview, Scott began to discuss Maurice Pierce and the purchase of a firearm. Pierce “had purchased a firearm the day before” the murders. He claimed it was a “.38 snub-nose, blue—or it was black. I was there when he purchased it. In the car. Couple of Hispanic boys. They did question them. Bought it right over by the school. Robert, me, Maurice, or another person.” Scott believed the Hispanics were younger kids. The transaction took place four blocks from the school. It appeared to be a spur-of-the moment purchase. “I don’t think it [was] a preplanned deal.
“We were not paying attention,” Scott said of himself and Springsteen in regard to the transaction. “We didn’t want to pay attention.”
Scott rocked back in his chair until he leaned against the wall in the small interview room. He began to waver on when the gun was purchased. With his hands crossed in his lap, Scott said that the gun was purchased forty-eight hours before December 6. He also claimed that Pierce stole a gold Isuzu Trooper, with a bad air conditioner, the same night.
At 10:05
A.M.
, Michael Scott placed his hands on the girls’ photos. “I think ‘Reese’ (Maurice Pierce’s nickname) was actually looking for some grass at the time, but got a gun instead.”
Suddenly Scott said to Lara and Hardesty, “I hope I’m not lying to you guys.
“We took it out and used it outside of the city limits. We went out to Lake Travis and shot it. He couldn’t shoot worth shit.”
Scott returned the conversation back to the night of the murders. He claimed that after talking with Hannah, they took off in Pierce’s dad’s car. He remembered the time to be around 3:30
P.M.
Scott drank three or four Budweisers in the car. “I used to drink like a fish,” Scott admitted. “I’m an alcoholic and I know it and I don’t drink anymore. I gave that up about five years ago.”
Scott continued with the details. They arrived at Northcross Mall around dusk and parked the car in the back of the mall. They walked into the mall, past the movie theaters, toward the food court. They met Welborn at the tables of the food court.
“We were all buzzing pretty good.”
Scott, Springsteen, Pierce, and Welborn sat around the food court, watching the nubile females as they passed by, and were indecisive as to “whether we were gonna hang out, cause trouble, or go watch a movie.”
According to Scott, Hannah and a young guy, whose name he could not remember, showed up at the food court. They all sat around inside the mall for another two to three hours. Pierce only stayed for an hour and told everyone he had to go take care of some business.
Scott yawned during the interview for the first time, at 10:24
A.M.
“The only reason we went to the mall was to look at girls and play videogames. T and A. Tits and ass. Be a general pest to everyone.”
Welborn took off after Pierce left.
Scott claimed that Pierce returned to the mall later that night and took him and Springsteen home.
“I don’t remember anything special about that night. Other than another night of going out, getting fucked up, hanging out at the mall, and going home and going to sleep.”
Scott told the detectives that after Pierce picked them up, they piled into the LTD and went to a guy’s house and smoked marijuana.
“The night is when things get really vague for me,” he relayed to the officers. “I smoked grass and I drank. Rob kept right up with me. He was really shit-faced by the time we got to the house.” According to Scott, the boys didn’t stay long.
“Maurice took us home. Smoked one-and-a-half joints. Stayed about one hour or an hour-and a half. Got back to his (Robert’s) condo at ten-thirty or eleven (
P.M.
). By that time the world was still spinning for me.” Scott claimed he watched a movie on cable television, then went to sleep around 1:00
A.M.
“I was sacked out on the couch. An itty-bitty condo.
“I woke up around ten-thirty or eleven o’clock the next morning.” He claimed Rob woke up later than he did. “The boy could sleep until, like two in the afternoon.
“We usually stayed out all hours in the morning. I was really fucked up. And I needed to go home. Robert was usually trashed too.”
10:40
A.M.
Detective Lara asked Mike if he wanted anything to drink. The interview had been going for almost 2½ hours and Scott had not drunk anything or eaten anything. He requested a Dr Pepper. As Lara left the room, Scott apologized. “I’m sorry my memory’s not so good, guys. That’s what I get for smoking too much grass.”
One minute later, Detective Hardesty stood up from his chair and headed out of the room. For the next seven minutes, Scott shifted around, not too uncomfortably. He stood up out of his chair and stretched. He sat back down in his chair and began to rock in it. He looked up toward the ceiling, peering intently at something. He stretched out and placed his feet on another chair. He sat up and walked around the table to look at the computer screen. He opened the unlocked door to the interview room and looked outside. He called out for Detective Hardesty, but received no reply. He walked back to his chair, sat down, and effortlessly tossed his pack of cigarettes on top of the photos of the girls. Finally, after seven minutes, Lara returned. Scott asked to go to the bathroom and was allowed to do so.
10:51
A.M.
Michael Scott returned to the interview room. A minute later, Lara and Hardesty returned. They saw Scott looking closely at the pictures of the girls. After a couple of minutes, he looked up from the photos and said, “This happened Friday. He (Pierce) had to have picked us up the day after.”
Scott had changed his story just 2½ hours into the interview.
He had been upset with Pierce. “He put me in a stolen truck. I had enough problems to deal with.” He began to talk about the joyride. “We went to one of the lakes, shot the firearms. I shot it twice. I pulled two rounds and Maurice shot the rest of them. I took a piece of limestone and chunked it out there as far as I could and shot at it a couple of times. Maurice shot at a loudspeaker horn thing.”
Scott claimed they stole gas from a Stop N Go convenience store in the Barton Creek area. “Didn’t get a full tank either.” From there, they took off south toward San Antonio. “I’m like, ‘Hey. You want to drive to Helotes? We need to get out of the city for a while.’” About three-quarters of the way there, Pierce fell asleep at the wheel. The SUV hit the median on Interstate 35. Pierce jolted awake and pulled the vehicle over. They noticed damage to the rim of the left front wheel. Scott got out and changed the tire. “Nobody else wanted to get their hands dirty.”
Scott took over and drove the rest of the way. They arrived around 11:00
A.M.
Scott claimed he did not know the truck was stolen until they came back to Austin. He then changed his story and admitted that he knew it was stolen.
Scott continued talking about the joyride. He claimed they drove to Helotes so he could see his girlfriend, Meredith Skipper, and break up with her. He told Lara that he met Skipper through the school orchestra in the summer of 1990 at a dance during UT band camp.