Dirty, vile, nasty nigger convicted of murdering 79 y/o white woman 22 years ago

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Man Is Convicted in 1984 Murder

Anna Houston was stabbed to death in her home; ex-officer sought justice.​

BARTOW -- Janet Franson's eyes filled with tears Friday for a 79-year-old woman whose brutal death inflamed the former police detective with a desire to find her killer.

"It took 22 years, but Anna Houston got justice today," Franson said, finally letting herself cry once outside the courtroom.

A jury convicted Robert Aus
tin Jr., 37, of first-degree murder in the stabbing death of Houston, whose body was discovered May 7, 1984, inside her apartment at the WestLake housing project in Lakeland.

Back in 1984, Franson was a Lakeland police patrol officer when Houston was killed. She still remembers helping in the vain search for the murder weapon.

When she later became a detective, she asked to work on the Houston case whenever she could find the time.

Franson, who is now retired and living in Montana, traveled back to Florida so she could testify about her involvement in the investigation.

She waited around Friday for several hours as the jury deliberated. Houston's grandson, Richard Conner, 36, also waited anxiously to see what would happen to Austin.

Conner said he will attend Austin's June 30 sentencing hearing, where Austin will receive a mandatory life sentence. "I'm glad it's over and justice is served," he said.

Houston was known as "The Cooki
e Lady" because she baked cookies for children in her Hartsell Avenue neighborhood and for fellow members of the Lakeside Church of the Nazarene on Brunnell Avenue.

For years, her death remained a mystery. There was no sign of forced entry. Nothing appeared to have been taken from her apartment.

Then in 2001, Austin, who was 15 at the time of the killing and lived with his parents near Houston's apartment, was indicted after new evidence was gathered in the case.

One piece of crucial evidence was testimony from an ex-girlfriend of Austin.

Sandra Chancey testified that Austin told her in the 1990s about killing a woman when he was younger.

Chancey, 44, said Austin told her that he had been drinking and went to ask the woman for money. The woman got upset, started pushing him and threatened to call the police.

"She told him to get out, and that's when everything started to happen," Chancey said.

Although
a murder weapon was never recovered, investigators did note that a kitchen drawer with knives had been left open inside Houston's apartment.

Afterward, Austin ran away, got rid of the knife and went home to wash up, Chancey said.

Two childhood acquaintances of Austin testified that he would often say he killed someone when he felt threatened, but they didn't believe him. One even went so far as to say he regarded Austin as a coward.

Assistant State Attorney Paul Wallace didn't disagree with that assessment of Austin during morning's closing arguments.

"Attacking a 79-year-old woman in the sanctity of her own home by someone who was allowed in because he was trusted is the work of a coward," Wallace told jurors.

Autopsy results concluded Houston received many deeply penetrating stabs and slash wounds to her neck. She also had wounds to her scalp, face, hands and right chest, which pierced her lung.

While at trial, Ci
rcuit Judge Susan Roberts had to carefully work with the defense and prosecution to select which disturbing photographs of Houston's injuries would be shown to jurors.

Houston -- a small woman who weighed about 100 pounds -- fought "valiantly" for her life as Austin repeatedly stabbed and slashed her, Wallace said, noting the many defensive wounds on her hands.

During the struggle, Austin was cut and left his blood inside the apartment, Wallace said. "If he hadn't, he would have never been caught," Wallace said.

DNA evidence was yet another critical piece of the prosecutor's case against Austin.

But in many ways, Franson's obsession with finding the killer was what helped push along developments in the cold case.

In late 1999, Franson spoke with a Ledger reporter about writing a story about Houston's unsolved murder to see whether anyone would come forward with information.

A story was publishe
d Jan. 4, 2000, in The Ledger, and anonymous tips began coming in that pointed to Austin as the killer.

On Feb. 22, 2000, detectives got a search warrant to obtain a blood sample from Austin, who was in prison on drug charges.

During closing arguments, Austin's lawyer, Robert Gray, urged jurors to consider problems with DNA evidence, such as the potential for contamination, mistakes and manipulation.

He reminded jurors that Austin told detectives that he would sometimes do yard work for Houston. He might have cut himself while doing yard work and bled inside her apartment when she let him have a glass of tea, Gray said.

"I don't know," Gray said. "You don't know. It's something to consider even if you believe all the DNA evidence put before you."

Throughout the trial, Gray also seemed to suggest that a neighbor, a man who is now dead, might have been responsible for Houston's death.

Gray said Houston also might have been the victim of a sexual assault.

He
pointed to FBI reports from the 1980s that show pubic hairs -- which didn't belong to Houston and came from a white person -- were found on her blue, floral housecoat and a rug near the crime scene.

Austin is black.

An FBI report also found semen on a vaginal swab from Houston.

Houston, a widow who still wore her ring on her finger, wasn't known to have boyfriends, Gray said.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement in Tampa didn't report finding semen on a swab. Houston's autopsy report didn't report finding sperm, but the testing used would not have detected whether semen were present.

But Wallace insisted that the question of whether Houston had sex was irrelevant to answering the question of who killed her.

He dismissed the defense's notion that a sexual assault took place -- noting that Houston was clothed in her housecoat and underwear, there was no trauma to her genitalia and no sign of a struggle in the bedroom.

He also said the pubic hairs could
have been deposited any number of ways other than from the killer.

"This particular killing has nothing to do with sex," Wallace said.