Episode 223: Nancy DePriest | Austin's Pizza Hut Murder

·1 hr 42 min·3 clips

On October 24, 1988, 20-year-old Nancy DePriest — a beloved Pizza Hut assistant manager, wife, and mother of a 15-month-old — was sexually assaulted and shot in the back of the head during a robbery at her Austin, Texas workplace. She had only been there because she switched shifts to play in a softball league. The attack occurred during the narrow window between her husband dropping off the car at 7:40am and the manager arriving at 9:30am. Nancy was found still alive but never recovered; her family honored her organ donor wishes, and her heart gave decades of life to a Texas man. The case drew enormous pressure on the Austin Police Department, which had been praised as Texas's safest major city. Suspects Chris Ochoa (22) and Robert Danziger (18), both Pizza Hut employees at other locations, drew attention when they toasted to Nancy's memory at the crime-scene restaurant and Danziger asked a security guard about the caliber of the murder weapon. Lead detective Hector Polanco subjected Ochoa to 24 hours of marathon interrogation over three days, lied that Danziger had confessed, and obtained a detailed signed confession. Early DQ-alpha DNA testing appeared to match Ochoa's sample and a pubic hair was microscopically linked to Danziger. Both men were arrested. Ochoa took a plea deal and agreed to testify against Danziger. The episode ends foreshadowing that both convictions may be a catastrophic wrongful conviction — raising profound questions about coercive interrogation tactics and primitive forensic evidence.

As heard by us

A Nancy DePriest case that turns on early DNA work, a confession, and a plea deal.

This episode follows the Nancy DePriest case from physical evidence to the 1988 DNA testing available at the time, then into Chris Ochoa's confession and plea deal.

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Press play if you want a serious true-crime case where early DNA testing and a confession shape the case.

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