TX TX - Cheryl Henry, 22, & Andy Atkinson, 21, Houston, 21 Aug 1990

[mocity]

At the time of Cheryl's death she was a college student home for the summer working an 8 to 5 office job.

 

[mocity]

Welcome back to the thread, mocity. I'm really hoping we can gain some attention for this terrible murder. It's been too long.

If you don't mind me asking - do you know anything about the golf club with bloodstains on it that one article reported was in the car? Do you know if it was Andy's, and if so, if he was a regular player?

We never heard anything else about blood on the golf club. The theory is that they could have pulled it out messing around and hitting balls. Andy had a set in his car I believe. They hadn't been dating that long so I am not sure if he was a regular player. I know he was athletic so it wouldn't suprise me.

 

[mocity]

I looked up the day Cheryl and Andy went on their date. It was a Wednesday (Aug. 22, 1990). I noticed another article saying they went out on Aug. 21, 1990, but at any rate it was in the middle of the week.

Yes - it was the middle of the week which is why everyone noticed when she didn't show up to work the next morning.

 

[mocity]

Yes, I believe he was the owner and the Star article I linked says Andy had just been promoted to manager of the club.

Just to clarify - Andy worked at Gold's Gym (workout facility here in Houston) and had been promoted to manager there - not at a bar.

 

[mocity]

I have a few questions I hope someone can answer:

How did the police know what the perp looked like for the composite drawing?

Was the murder weapon found?

Did LE check out the girl's male high school friends from the past? Maybe one still held a torch for her and felt rejected.

Is the area a place where people would come in from out of town?

Trying to answer these questions -
(1) The police knew what he looked like for the composite because the girl he raped (that he didnt kill) saw him
(2) No murder weapon found
(3) Yes - LE checked up on all her male high school friends
(4) at the time the location was a well mainted park like area close to some office buildings surrounded by trees. In high school it was a gathering place to meet our friends and listen to music. I don't think it would be somewhere someone from out of town would stumble upon.

 

[mocity]

I am answering my own post here, but I just had a thought on this . . . maybe this guy remembers seeing Cheryl as a stripper in the past and saw her at the nightclub that evening . . then followed her. Just a thought . . .

Cheryl was not a stripper.... she waitressed for a brief time at a club and this was not close to the time she was killed - it was years before. Cheryl was living at home with our parents for the summer while she was home from college. She was working a 8-5 office job that summer.

 

[zwiebel]

Thanks so much for clarifying all this information. I think it is so important that you have made it clear that Cheryl was not - and never was - a striptease artist in a club. She was a waitress in a club for a short period, years before her death.

That makes looking for a 'club' link between the case of the rape and Cheryl's murder a step in the wrong direction, imo.

The news that the 'open area' was a popular, well-maintained park is really useful too.

 

[zwiebel]

I'm guessing an August night in Houston would have been warm and dry.
It was a nice park, not really that late for young people........I'm wondering how many other people might have been there too.

 

[zwiebel]

The connections that seemed to link all the victims are falling away imo.

At first it seemed obvious; Cheryl, Andy and the woman who was raped all worked in clubs. It seemed to hint where to look for the killer.

But now we know Andy worked in a gym, Cheryl had worked as a waitress but only for a short period, a long time before she was murdered, and only the woman who was raped was working at a club.

Maybe there are other connections;
They were all under 30
Both women were raped
Both attacks took place after 11pm at night
A male partner was present in one attack, was mentioned by the rapist in another.
One attack place in an open space only locals would know of, the other took place in an apartment close to an open space.

The differences;
One female victim was a college kid, the other a striptease artist.
One male victim was a gym manager, the other male mentioned by the killer was a pilot.
One attack took place in the open air, one in an apartment.
Two victims were murdered in one attack, in the other the victim was not.

What immediately jumps out at me is that the killer was wearing a mask when he raped the woman, and tried a clumsy red herring about uniforms to mislead her. He maybe let her live beause he was confident she would not recognise him.

Could that mean then, that he killed Cheryl and Andy because he wasn't masked, and knew they could describe him - might even have known him? If he wasn't masked then it wasn't planned. That would probably rule out a killer sitting in the park, waiting for victims.

But we know the killer was in the park, obviously. Cheryl's body was left by a tree draped with decorations. It seems like local people might have chosen that spot before, to party in. Maybe people around Cheryl and Andy's age? Maybe even people they knew, and the killer was among them.

 

[justthinkin]

Mocity, I'm sorry for your loss, and I truly hope one day justice is served for Cheryl and Andy. Your families deserve it too.

Up until 1985, I used to live not far from where this took place. I know the area well as our family lived there for about 11 years, moving when our oldest was still in middle school. The crime from and in nearby apartments convinced us it was time to move.

Fast forward a couple of years, and we hear from friends still living in our old neighborhood that their 13 year old daughter had been raped at knife point one night while the family and the family dog slept. The rapist had come in through the daughter's bedroom window. She was told he'd kill her if she made a peep. I was horrified. This happened a long time ago, and the memory came back while I was sitting here reading this thread.

Now I sit here wondering if the person who raped our friends' daughter could possibily have been the same person who later killed Cheryl and Andy? I hope HPD considered the possibility,but who knows. I do know a rape kit was used, but I never heard if the person responsible was ever caught. If not, HPD should compare the dna from the two cases. This happened not 3 1/2 miles from where your sister and her boyfriend were murdered.

Before we left that neighborhood, we had a small scare ourselves one evening. My husband, myself and our two youngest went for a walk in the neighborhood toward dusk. As we walked down one of the blocks, darkness had settled in, and a car passed us, and turned at the end of the block. Less than a minute passed, and here came that same car again, this time slowing down, in an apparent attempt to observe us. It had circled the block. I had learned somewhere that when someone unknown is watching you, it's best if you let them know you see them too, so I stared back at the dark, gray car's occupants, but it was really too dark to see their faces or discern anything else about them. The car held at least 3 males. It drove off again, and I had a sickening, creeped-out feeling wash over me. Told my husband and kids we needed to hide in some tall, thick bushes that happened to be in someone's front yard one house away. We did, and sure enough, here came that car again, but when it didn't see us it sped straight away. We stayed hidden in case it came around again on a longer circling route, but it didn't so we scurried home, a few blocks away.

Our old neighborhood was nice, lots of families with children, but when the HUD apartments went up at Kirkwood and Briar Forest, it became a scarier place. My husband knew some HPD officers, and they told us those apartments were as bad as any in all of Houston, murder, rape, meth labs, prostitution, pedofiles, you name it, they had it all.

I'm going to go back, reread, and hopefully ask some pertinent questions.

 

[zwiebel]

Thanks justthinkin, it's great to have some input in this case. I can't help feeling your intuition saved you from something terrible there.

 

[zwiebel]

justthinkin, do you happen to know if there was a park or open space close to where your friend's daughter was attacked?

 

[justthinkin]

No, the rape occurred at their house in the subdivision. There were no parks, and actually there was no park where Cheryl and Andy's murder took place, only a water treatment plant across the street that had completed some beautification around some retention ponds. The area where the murders happened was in a new development, but when we moved it was still mostly undeveloped. Park like is how a person might describe the area as a whole.

 

[kemo]

This is an interesting case I had never heard of. I have just spent the last couple hours getting up to speed.

The most significant difference between the two known crimes of this Perp is that "Lover's Lane" sexual assaults, which are quite common in the US, are almost always situations where the assailant does not know the victim(s) while breaking and entering and waiting for a victim to come home almost always involve a situation where the assailant is targeting a specific victim.

In every "lovers Lane" case I am aware of, the Perp laid in wait for the first couple to came to that area that meets his criteria. Couples rarely make it known to even their closest friends that they are going to a specific "make out spot" after a date. If someone were targeting either Henry or Atkinson, they would have to have been following them and waiting all evening with no assurance that he would find them in a spot where this sort of attack could have been committed. I would guess the odds are close to 100% that the guy wanted to attack a random couple and went to a "Lover's Lane" he was aware of, to do his deed on an unsuspecting could he had never met.

"Lover's Lanes" are generally used by people who have access to cars but do not have their own apartments; generally people 16 to 23. One learns of these places through word of mouth. Most young people know of such places but if they were to move after age 25, they would probably never learn about the same type of places in their new community.

I am speculating that our Perp spent his late teens or early 20's near
Enclave Parkway and Henry and Atkinson were random victims.

I think out guy knew "the rape victim" either from the club where she worked, the neighborhood where she lived or somewhere else and followed her and got to know her routine and then planned his attack. His implication that he knew her boyfriend was probably a red herring and may also have been a way of letting her know that he knew the boyfriend was out of town.

The Perp may have still live in the Enclave Parkway area but more likely, he lived closer to Terra Cotta Dr. Stalking someone who lives that far away would involve a lot of driving. I would expect most predators to chose a victim a little closer to home.

 

[justthinkin]

Thanks justthinkin, it's great to have some input in this case. I can't help feeling your intuition saved you from something terrible there.

No kidding. It seemed almost as if the men in that car were cruising around looking for victims. They had to be pretty sure of themselves if they were giving thought to taking on the 4 of us. The hair literally stood up on my arms the 2nd. time they drove slowly by us. Never had that happen before or since. I believe the threat they posed was a real one.

 

[justthinkin]

This is an interesting case I had never heard of. I have just spent the last couple hours getting up to speed.

The most significant difference between the two known crimes of this Perp is that "Lover's Lane" sexual assaults, which are quite common in the US, are almost always situations where the assailant does not know the victim(s) while breaking and entering and waiting for a victim to come home almost always involve a situation where the assailant is targeting a specific victim.

In every "lovers Lane" case I am aware of, the Perp laid in wait for the first couple to came to that area that meets his criteria. Couples rarely make it known to even their closest friends that they are going to a specific "make out spot" after a date. If someone were targeting either Henry or Atkinson, they would have to have been following them and waiting all evening with no assurance that he would find them in a spot where this sort of attack could have been committed. I would guess the odds are close to 100% that the guy wanted to attack a random couple and went to a "Lover's Lane" he was aware of, to do his deed on an unsuspecting could he had never met.

"Lover's Lanes" are generally used by people who have access to cars but do not have their own apartments; generally people 16 to 23. One learns of these places through word of mouth. Most young people know of such places but if they were to move after age 25, they would probably never learn about the same type of places in their new community.

I am speculating that our Perp spent his late teens or early 20's near
Enclave Parkway and Henry and Atkinson were random victims.

I think out guy knew "the rape victim" either from the club where she worked, the neighborhood where she lived or somewhere else and followed her and got to know her routine and then planned his attack. His implication that he knew her boyfriend was probably a red herring and may also have been a way of letting her know that he knew the boyfriend was out of town.

The Perp may have still live in the Enclave Parkway area but more likely, he lived closer to Terra Cotta Dr. Stalking someone who lives that far away would involve a lot of driving. I would expect most predators to chose a victim a little closer to home.

I like your thinking. I am not caught up on the rape case where the woman was able to give LE a description they could use to come up with a sketch, but both would be within an area of reasonable familiarity for a serial killer who spends a lot of time cruising streets. According to google maps Terra Cotta and Enclave Round are only 30 mins. apart.

I think this was an active serial killer, and am making a list of possibly related crimes. When I get done, will post it. I don't think he knew the victims or followed them from the club. If he'd followed anyone from the club logic says he have followed the younger sister and her date.

As I recall, there were some older apartments across Buffalo Bayou on the Memorial side that faced the new development area or rather the backside of the apartments did. In August, he might have been able to walk from those apartments across the bayou, and into the Enclave area, and walk back. I'm going to guess roughly 600 yards max, and there were trails that paralled the bayou, but I'm not sure if they went that far west. I know there was a trail off Dairy Ashford. I do think the guy felt comfortable operating in both areas and in between.

 

[justthinkin]

My guess is whoever confronted them was either on foot or had a car parked not far from theirs, but probably not on Enclave Round. With blood in the car, it makes me think they were just flat out ambushed.

Something's not adding up for me. The blood in the car plus both Cheryl and Andy having their hands bound or Cheryl bound, and Andy tied to a tree. Mocity said in the older thread on the case that Cheryl didn't fight back. So I'm not sure if she was killed at the car when the killer first surprised them or if she was taken from the car, and then later taken back to the car and killed there.

Can someone clear this up for me?

 

[zwiebel]

Mocity will be certain, but everything I have seen suggests the couple were marched from the woods, where both were tied up - in a way LE said had some significance - and Cheryl was raped and killed and Andy was killed. One msm report says that Andy was tied up far enough away so Cheryl would have been just out of sight. Cheryl was covered with old fencing. Andy's poor dad actually walked past the tree that Andy was tied to several times while he was searching, but didn't see him. They were not robbed, but apparently items were taken from the woman who was raped.

There are a couple of mentions of a bloodstained golfclub, belonging to Andy, being in the car. But the bloodstains are uncertain.

Thanks so much for the input and clearing up my questions about open spaces. I'm not much good at posting maps, but looking at the location of Terracotta, Enclave Parkway and Briar Forest, I can't help feeling all those locations would have been 'convenient' for a local perp. I wonder if LE ever had a POI in this case initially, and if they managed to check his DNA with that found on the woman who was raped? The rape kit results were not found until many years later, so any POI could have been long gone by then.

 

[zwiebel]

Forgot to add, I think they were ambushed too. Music, necking in the car.....they never got the chance to feel those hairs prickling on the backs of their necks, that might have saved them, poor things.

 

[zwiebel]

Don't give up hope anybody. This 1969 case in Houston resulted in a conviction in 2003, thanks to new publicity. Maybe that's what Cheryl and Andy need.

http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2011/october/print_101411