Elizabeth Shumate, JoAnn Brown & Francis Ivey

Warning This episode contains graphic crime scene detail. Please listen with discretion. Welcome to Primetime Crime. I'm your host, Kylie. Let's talk right now in true crime, and then together we are going to work on warming up some cold cases. Let's go. Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of Primetime Crime. It's Kylie. Well, You're going to go ahead and dive into you right now in True Crime, which honestly is probably just going to be me giving you a update on the Crystal Rogers case because one of the first trials in her case officially started this week. And I have a lot to say, and I have a lot of thoughts. First thing, though, Rust armorer Hannah Gutier's read, if you guys remember that was the movie set, the movie Rust that Alec Baldwin was working on when he got his hands on a prop that was loaded and it ended up taking the life of somebody on set, and Hannah Goutier's read was in charge of the weapon and it was a prop, so making sure that everything was up to par and nothing was loaded, and unfortunately that wasn't the case, and Helena lost her life. So she was found guilty. She was sentenced, but she is now out of prison because of good behavior, which we knew was going to happen, because Hannah, in my opinion, did not do anything intentionally. She isn't a bad person. She made a mistake. Unfortunately it did cost someone their lives. But I'm really not surprised that she was able to get out so early on into her sentence. So she is out Officially, she served a little over a year, and she is currently on parole and going to be residing in Arizona. So any other updates that come out on her, I will be sure to share them. So let's go ahead and move on to what I said at the top of the episode that I wanted to talk about, which was the Crystal Rogers case. Now, for those that aren't familiar, Crystal Rogers went missing in twenty fifteen. She has never been found. So finally, after many years, they've arrested a few people in connection with Crystal rogers disappearance. One of them is this man named Steven Lawson, and he faced his charges of tampering with evidence and conspiracy to commit murder. Now there's other people involved too, We're going to get to them in a little bit. But she went missing like I said July of twenty fifteen. She was a mother of five. So they selected fifteen jurors. Three are alternates, and it consists of ten women and five men. During opening statements from the state, prosecutors said that evidence will show that Stephen Lawson's phone was tracked to where Crystal's car was abandoned the night that she disappeared. They also said that he called Brooks how who is Crystal Rogers ex boyfriend, around midnight and told him quote the job was done end quote, and if that's true, that makes me actually sick to my stomach now. The defense said that they're not going to deny that Steven Lawson is guilty of tampering with evidence because he did help move Crystal's car and even pulled the driver's seat up to make it look like Crystal drove her car there and left it. But they are saying that there is no evidence that he conspire to murder Crystal, and they are arguing that the case is very much still open because Crystal's body has never been found. Crystal's mom, who is named Sherry Ballard, was one of the first witnesses to testify, and she said that she knew something was wrong when Crystal didn't respond to her text and her calls that came in from her kids. She was very close with her kids. She was a fantastic mom. So according to the state, they believe that Stephen Lawson and his son Joseph Lawson helped Crystal's ex boyfriend Brooks carry out the murder of Crystal Rogers. So there is tampering with evidence, conspiracy to commit murder, and then Brooks is charged with murder in Crystal's case and their trials are up and coming, so this is going to be a busy summer for trials. But I do want to talk about some of the testimony from day two of trial. So on day two we heard from a woman named Elizabeth Chester and her mom dated Steve in twenty seventeen, and she said that Steve told her that his ex wife was leaving him because she said he had quote murder on him end quote. And then she also testified that Steve admitted to moving Crystal's car in twenty fifteen and allegedly said no evidence, no case. And this Elizabeth chestergal also has a child with Joseph Lawson, who is Stephen's son, who's also charged in this murder conspiracy to commit murder. Holy moly. Now, there was another witness that testified that she worked for Brooks Houck, who, like I said, is Crystal's ex boyfriend, and they all worked together in construction. Crystal's ex boyfriend Brooks, Stephen Joseph and this witness, and she claimed that a couple of weeks before Crystal's disappearance, Stephen and Brooks were writing around in a trip together and the witness had kind of inquired about what they were discussing, what they were talking about, and allegedly she claims that Stephen lost and told her quote, I gotta go take care of this girl with five kids end quote. And this witness said she didn't really question anything, didn't think anything of it until Crystal banished, and then at that point she reported that she had had that interaction with Steven to the authorities. There was another construction worker who claimed that Steven Lawson told him that Brooks had asked him to get rid of Crystal. So, yeah, things aren't going well at least if you're Brooks or these two Losson boys, because there I think is a lot of evidence against them. It did take them a while to finally make an arrest. In this case, there's also the whole Tommy Ballard of it all. Crystal's dad who was killed on his own property, shot and killed on his own property after Crystal passed away because he was heavily investigating what had happened to her and he was not going to stop until he got down to the bottom of it. So there's that whole thing as well. And at this point it's just going to be really really interesting because there's a lot going on. Brooks family him in law enforcement, there's a lot going on. There's a lot of alleged, in my opinion, cover up. Brooks's brother, Nick was a law enforcement officer, although he no longer is because he lost his job because no shocker, he was interfering in the investigation into Crystal Rogers disappearance. And honestly, I've had this conversation on this podcast before. If anybody ever comes to you and says, I really want to get rid of somebody in my life, will you help me with the crime, the answer is automatically immediately going to be no, I will not. I don't understand how these two men get themselves involved in this alleged murder, and now they're going to if they are found guilty, which I believe that they will be, spend the rest of their lives in jail for literally helping this punk Brooks with this alleged Thomis side of Crystal. It doesn't make any sense to me. You have no loyalty to this guy, why would you do it? It makes absolutely zero sense to me. Why people risk their freedom and their livelihood and are willing to take somebody else's life for somebody who has ill intentions and wants to do bad things. It will never make any sense to me. These were just Brooks coworkers, so the fact that there is no loyalty there really confuses me as to why they would get themselves involved in a situation like this. There is never ever going to be a day in my life when somebody approaches me that I would agree to help them either cover upper murder, commit a murder, have anything to do with any type of situation where I am helping them spose of evidence or anything like that. I am immediately going to the police and turning them inmmediately. It makes no sense to me. But the rest of this trial is going to be very interesting. I will be sure to keep you guys updated. And then Joseph and Brooks are going to be tried together, which again I think is really interesting. So we're going to see how this plays out. But this is just a small step in the right direction to getting justice for Crystal. And then we still have Tommy Ballard, who nobody has been charged in his murder, although I think the writing is probably on the wall, at least in my opinion, it's obviously connected. We aren't stupid. So that is it for right now in true crime. There's not a lot going on right now, but I did want to touch on the Crystal Rogers of it all. Of course, Karen Reid and Diddy are still ongoing. That is honestly just so much to even try to navigate. But if anything crazy happens in any tri I would be sure to bring you guys the updates as they come in. But we are going to go ahead and get into this week's episode. Alrighty guys, Today we are jumping into a brand new unsolved triple homicide out of Houston, Texas in nineteen eighty three. We're going to be discussing the murders of three women, Elizabeth Shoemate, Joanne Brown, and Francis Ivy, who I will call Fran. They were all real estate agents and they were all killed at the Shoemate and Company real estate office in West Houston in August of nineteen eighty three. Despite having a composite sketch of one of the potential suspects, this case remains unsolved. To this day. We are coming up on forty two years of this case being unsolved, and again, like all of the cases I cover, I do think this case is solvable. So as always, in order to understand how we got where we're at today, we have to talk about what happened leading up to the crime. On August eighteenth of nineteen eighty three, the city of Houston was hit by a Category three hurricane, a hurricane that went by the name Alisha, so Hurricane Alicia is described as a small but powerful storm, and damage was widespread from Galveston to Houston. This storm destroyed nearly all of the skyscrapers in some way, and they saw the loss of a lot of the lower level windows, which is wild when you realize how big and powerful and mighty these skyscrapers are. And to just know that the glass from the lower level windows was broken and on the streets. It really makes you understand how powerful the winds and all are in these hurricanes. There were power outages, flooding, and rainfall totals peaked at nine point nine to five inches at the time. It was the costliest Atlanta hurricane, bringing the damage toll to three billion dollars, which was a heck of a lot of money back in nineteen eighty three. And anyone that lived in Houston during Alicia to this day will tell you that it was a big storm and it's going to go down in history as one of the biggest. But the next day, on April nineteenth of nineteen eighty three, a bigger storm was coming for three families who would never be the same again. It was a Friday afternoon when the worst news came through. Three women who worked as real estate agents were found shot dead in their Houston area real estate office. The murders happened around closing time, after most people in the office had already left. Another worker had returned to the office to get some yard signs around six point thirty PM and discovered the crime scene and alerted authorities. The office was located along Memorial Drive, and it was a super cute, little white and yellow old Victorian home that had been transported to this piece of property and it became the Shoemate real Estate Office, and it was the last place that you would assume a tragic triple homicide would occur. The victims were Elizabeth Shoemate, who was fifty four years old, Joanne Brown, who was forty six, and Fran Ivy, who was sixty. Investigators said all the women were shot in the back of the head, execution style. Elizabeth Shoemate had been tied up and Joanne and fran were close by her, and they had some jewelry stolen from them. It did appear that the women had attempted to hide some of their jewelry underneath couch cushions and in trash cans. Investigators didn't really have anything much to go on, but this case did get a lot of local attention. Shortly after the murder, somebody came forward and said that they saw a man near the real estate office around the time that the murders would have occurred. Investigators decided to release a composite sketch of this man which I am going to be sure to share on my Instagram and Facebook pages. But nothing really ever came of this, at at least not that the public was made aware of, and investigators would later go on to say that they believe more than one person was involved in this triple homicide, and for reasons unknown, investigators also initially thought that one of the perpetrators could have been a woman. Now, there were two different types of firearms used in the commitment of these crimes, so I think that in their minds, that's why they think there was more than one perpetrator. Law enforcement also would go on to check local pawnshops hoping to come across the item stolen from the women, but nothing like that ever turned up. Investigators, of course, did not have much to go on here, so they ended up pouring through each of the women's lives looking for different clues or possible motives. They even had an angle of looking at another business that was run out of the real estate office, and it was an oil field equipment sales company that was called Shoemate International that was right by Elizabeth's husband and given the name of the real estate company Shemate Real Estate Company. It's pretty safe to say that her husband also ran this business, so he had a couple of different businesses that he was running out of this real estate office. And I haven't really been able to find anything on him or anything that he has come forward with and said anything about the murders, despite him owning this business and his wife being brutally murdered there, I haven't seen much of anything about him or his stance on things, or his thoughts or anything, which, in my opinion, is very interesting to say the least. I do know that the Victorian house was later torn down, so the crime scene where this triple homicide occurred no longer exists. Now. Initially investigators did think that this could have been a robbery motive versus something personal, but they've never been able to really confirm that. In an interview that Sergeant Richard Rodriguez with the Houston Police Cold Case Unit did, he said, quote, it didn't seem like a random run of the mill, one of those crimes of opportunity. It was something that looks like it was planned out, that was purposely executed. It didn't look like there was a big struggle, a big fight, nothing like that end quote, which in my opinion very much could allude to the fact that maybe whoever did do this, the perpetrator or perpetrators were familiar to these three women. But again that is just my opinion, because even if the perpetrators were familiar with these women, and they were familiar with them, they went in and let them in there. So to say, I think these three women would have put up a hell of a fight once they realized that things were going in the direction that they were going. I don't think that they willingly would have let these people commit this heinous crime against them without putting up a fight. So even down to the fact that they did go as far as to hide some of their jewelry, I think is very telling as to the mindset that these three women were in at the time that they were being attacked by this heinous person or persons, and I know that they likely did everything they could in their power to survive. Now, in my opinion, the fact that this case is still cold after all of this time is just astonishing. The fact that somebody could go in there and kill these three women and leave without any detection is just absolutely wild to me, especially after all this time. KPRC Channel two did a story on the case, and they did this story about a year ago and they interviewed Franz's daughter, Helen Ivy Maldonado following the fortieth anniversary of the homicides. Zach Lashway led the interview with Helen, and we're going to talk about that a little bit now. Helen said that she was only twenty one and her mom was killed, and she herself just turned sixty, which is the same age that her mom was when her life was brutally taken. Helen said, it's surreal to be the same age that her mom was, and it really puts things into perspective, in my opinion, how long it's been without answers for these families. They go on to talk about the Houston Cold Case Division and they own about six thousand cold cases that date back to the nineteen thirties. They asked Helen the latest on the case, and Helen said, there's nothing new in the case, and they've kind of been given the run around. They were told they couldn't run DNA for one reason or another it's too expensive. In two thousand and eight, Helen and her dad spoke with the Cold Case Division head and they said that it's too expensive and the Houston Police Department didn't have the equipment to send this DNA away or run the DNA themselves. And then Helen goes on to say that there was an interview that was done with the individual who's in charge of the case now, and during that interview he said that they ran DNA in two thousand and six, which was never told to or shared with the family. So there's a lot of questions. Did they run the DNA, did they not. One thing that Helen said was the last thing she heard is that they wouldn't release the DNA. They had wanted them to release it to AUTHRAM, which I talk about AUTHRAAM all the time. It's nearby in the Woodlands. It's about honestly thirty to forty minutes from Houston, so it's super super local and super super close. So if anywhere is going to be sent the DNA, it should be AUTHORAM. They should release it to AUTHREM and they can run it and take it from there. Houston Police Department owns this case and for whatever reason, they do not want to release the DNA, at least according to what Helen knows. So Elizabeth shoemate's hands were bound together with a Venetian blindboard, and that is the evidence that Helen knows about, So that is what they would be running the DNA on because they have the evidence from there that they have been storing for over forty years. And I honestly can't imagine how frustrating this is for the families hearing from Helen and all that she has tried to do to keep the story in the media. She's tried to keep in touch with law enforcement, She's tried to persuade them to get the DNA tested, and she's constantly met with roadblocks and people that either just aren't being honest with her or act like they don't want to help. And that's something, unfortunately, we see time and time again with some of these decades long cold cases, and I can't even imagine being on the other end of that and wanting so desperately to have some resolution in the case, find out what happened, potentially find out who's responsible, and being met by roadblocks at every single turn. And that is really what I hope doing episodes like this helps with, because I think exposure is key and putting pressures on the power that be is important because sometimes I think unfortunately departments are underfunded, they're understaffed. There's a lot of cold cases that some of these departments have under their built and I think a lot of the times it's not because they don't care, but it's because they just don't have the resources and the cases just kind of sit on the back burner and they kind of lose that spark and then it's kind of one lest thing that they have to deal with. And unfortunately, sometimes that does happen. And I think it's important to not leg your foot off the gas and keep these cases in the spotlight and make the cold case unit and divisions understand that these cases are important to a lot of people and solving them is important. And then we see cases where the investigators give it their all and they are held bent on solving whatever cold case it may be, and they put their heart and soul into it. And those are the people that we want working these cold cases. But unfortunately, a lot of the departments and the cases I covered do have a lot of pushback from law enforcement, and that should never be the case. Pressure should be put on these departments to do everything in their power to try to solve the case. Run the DNA crowdfund if you need to get the money needed to run the DNA. It is so, so so important because with all the advancements in DNA technology, so many of these cases that have evidence sitting in a locker are solvable and they can be solved literally with the little bit of DNA that they might have. So unfortunately that is where this case stands today. I am hopeful that the DNA will get sent off and will get in and we will have resolution in this case for these three families. I do want to take a minute, though, to honor the victims in this case. Their lives were cut short in a very horrific way, and they deserve justice. I found a forum that was speaking on the murders, and I found some statements about the victims that I felt are important to share. Our three victims, Elizabeth Shoemate, fran Ivy, and joe Anne Brown. Their lives are important, their legacy is important, and it's important to remember them for the kind of people they were. One user stated that she had worked with fran Ivy previously in a real estate office and she was quote a wonderful, cheerful intelligent lady that was my mentor in real estate. She loved her family more than anything. End quote. Another user said that Helen Ivy was a dear friend of hers in elementary and junior high and she spent time at her house and she members, well how sweet Fran was. And then she goes on to say that Elizabeth Shoemate was her fifth grade teacher at Thornwood Elementary before she became a real estate agent, and that she was a great teacher. At the time of the murder, she said she was working as a hairstylist and she had Joanne Brown as a client and that she actually had done her hair that same day that Joanne was murdered. She goes on to say that all three of the women were beautiful souls and that she praised for answers and justice for their families. Another user goes on to say that she knew Fran from the Briar Hills Women's Club and she was the charter president at the time, and the user who's posting this was the vice president, and she said that Fran was such a nice, personal, thoughtful and sweet lady. In another article, I found Joanne Brown's daughter who is named Patty said that her mom, Joanne, is the best mom ever. Everything was always about my sister and I. She worked very hard and she loved hard. I am going to be sharing photos of all three of the victims. I'm going to be sharing a couple of photos of the Victorian House from the time that the murders occurred. Like I said, the Victorian House was torn down and the land was vacant for a long time. It does appear now that there is some apartment homes on that piece of property where the realtor's office once stood. Obviously, times change in Houston consistently, but from nineteen eighty three to twenty twenty five, there have been a lot of changes in the area. So as of right now, it does appear to me that there is apartment homes on that piece of property that was vacant for so long. I also know back then that this case did receive just local attention, but national attention. It was also covered on Oprah's talk show way back in the day. I wasn't able to find the actual clip of the Oprah Show, but I did find a short little clip of a local station talking about it being featured on the Oprah Show. It is about two minutes long. I'm going to play that for you. Now. This was ten years after the homicide, so this was in the nineties that this aired. It was a shocking case of triple murder. All three of the victims, Elizabeth Schuemate, fran Ivy and Joanne Brown, were shot in the back of the head with a pistol. The unsolved case, though it is ten years old, is now attracting national attention. They are all unsolved murders, and the detectives on the killer's trail are all obsessed with finding the person for persons who did it. It has been a frustrating case for Sergeant David Calhoun. He spent hours at the scene on that fateful day gathering every bit of evidence available. The days it followed brought a composite picture of a possible suspect. We think that there was probably two bad guys. It's very, very possible that one of them might have been a female. The victims' family members have their own ideas about the case, and they remain confident that the determined detective will somehow break the case. It's still something that's at the top of his list. I guess it's kind of a personal case for him, just because he has been involved since the beginning. But Sergeant Calhoun admits he suffered with a sense of failure. One day, you feel guilty. You sit down and you re read the report. Did I miss something? If I overlook something? But clues will come in. You feel the high. Okay, I'm on a good trail. Now the trail that ends it comes to a brick wall and you're back down in the low. So it's a roller coaster. The hope of investigators in family is that the new publicity about the case will somehow lead to the person or persons who took three lives. So that was from the Oprah show that it was clips that were gathered and it was played locally. But yeah, that is kind of where we still stand today. We don't have any more answers than when that originally aired in the nineties, which is a heck of a long time ago. It's so wild that this case has been cold for such a long time. I do hope that the DNA is sent over and that we do have resolution in this case sooner rather than later, because forty two years coming up on it is way too long for a triple homicide to go unsolved, thinking that the perpetrator or perpetrators, the people who did this are still out there. If you have the capability to do this to three innocent real estate women that are mining their own business at their job, imagine what horrific things this person could do to other people. That is why getting these people off of the streets is so important. And I'm not going to stop doing these episodes until every single one of them has resolution. I know that's a big ask, but I am bound and determined to keep sharing these cold cases until every single one has the justice that it needs behind it. So that is this week's episode. Thank you guys so much for listening. Justice for Elizabeth, Joanne, and fran It's so so important. Please share this episode. Share it with a friend, Share it with a family member, especially if you had family or friends in the Houston area in nineteen eighty three. They may be holding a piece of the puzzle that they don't even know that they're holding. They might have seen something, they might have heard something, loyalties might have shifted, and it is time now to come forward. If you do have any information, call crime Stoppers of Houston at seven to one three two to two tips. You can also submit anonymous tips online through their website or their app. There is up to a five thousand dollars reward for information leading to an arrest, and like I said, you can remain anonymous. You can also contact the Houston Police Cold Case Unit at seven one three three zero eight three six one eight. I thank you guys so very much for listening to this week's episode and giving these three the attention that they need and that they deserve. So I hope you guys have a fantastic weekend and I will see you next week for a brand new unsolved case. Have a great weekend. By