Supremes Reject Travis Co. Prosecutors' Yogurt Shop Appeal

The U.S. Supreme Court today denied Travis Co. prosecutors’ request to review the case of Robert Springsteen IV, who was convicted in connection with the infamous 1991 yogurt-shop murders. Springsteen’s conviction was overturned last May, after the state Court of Criminal Appeals finally – after the case sat on their docket for nearly three years – ruled his conviction was tainted by the trial court’s improper ruling that allowed prosecutors to use written portions of another defendant’s “confession” as evidence of Springsteen’s guilt, in violation of Springsteen’s Sixth Amendment right to cross-examine witnesses.

The ruling means prosecutors must either retry Springsteen or set him free. Not surprisingly, Travis Co. prosecutors have said they will opt for the former, vowing to retry Springsteen – though without the bolstering confession of defendant Michael Scott (who was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the crime), it is hard to imagine how they’ll manage to secure another conviction. Indeed, there are major problems with the state’s case – including the existence of physical evidence at the crime scene that does not match any of the four victims or the four young men accused of the crime and the dearth of evidence tying Springsteen to the crime, save for partially inculpating statements he made to police in 1999 after hours of interrogation.

(Springsteen was originally sentenced to die for his alleged role in the grisly quadruple murder before the Supremes ruled that juveniles were ineligible to receive the death penalty. Springsteen was 17 in 1991, meaning his death sentence could not stand in the face of the high court’s ruling.)

For more on Springsteen and the yogurt-shop case, see “Somebody Has to Die,” June 15, 2001.