Something is happening in the waters of Austin, Texas. In the last two years, more than a dozen bodies have been pulled from Austin’s Lady Bird Lake, also known as Town Lake, which sits in front of the city’s downtown. Many of these bodies were found in similar to exact spots in the lake. Some victims’ descriptions are close matches for one another. And almost every single investigation has been closed by the Austin Police Department (APD), leaving little to no answers for the families and friends left behind.
Lady Bird Lake stretches for miles in Austin and can be accessed through multiple entry points from a trail that surrounds it. This walking trail is extremely popular among residents and visitors alike.
In 2018, 25-year-old Martin Gutierrez had recently moved to Austin after finishing school at Texas Tech. He was living with his brother Mitchell and sister-in-law Whitney Gutierrez and enjoying life as a new college grad.
The city offered a vibrant social life, and the three of them took full advantage.
“We really made the most of those 11 months for sure. At the time, he was 25, I was 27,” Whitney told me when she was a guest on my podcast. “We were just really energetic at that time in our 20s and he was new to Austin so we were always out and about, always with friends, always doing fun things.”
One night, Martin, Whitney, Mitchell, and other friends and family went out for dinner. Afterward, he decided to stay back and grab a drink with friends before heading home for the night. One drink and two bars later, things took a very dark turn.
“Our last footage is from the Towers at Town Lake which is a hotel I believe or an apartment complex. We do have footage of him just walking… he’s not really stumbling. He’s looking down at his phone, you can see the light on his phone in the video and that’s the last footage we have of him,” said Whitney.
Martin didn’t make it home that night. Whitney and Mitchell thought it was weird he didn’t show up the next day, but he was an adult, so they figured maybe he went straight into work or was staying with another friend.
A day passed by before Whitney and Mitchell began to truly worry. When a second day came and went without any contact from Martin, they knew something was seriously wrong.
“We went to bed that night, we were like ‘kind of weird.’ Wake up the next morning, still not home, keys still on the table, car still outside and that’s when we started like ‘OK, something is wrong,’” said Whitney. “We had been calling him a number of times that day and the phone was going straight to voicemail, that also was very unlike him.”
They reported him missing to police. A citywide search ensued. News stations covered the story of the missing 25-year-old. Police searched all over town. His family put up flyers. Days passed with them no closer to finding Martin.
After a week of searching, they got the call that a body had been found. According to Whitney, the body was found near where they believed Martin had gone in the lake and was wearing the exact same clothes. APD and the Travis County Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed it was Martin’s body.
The medical examiner deemed his death an accidental drowning. No foul play was suspected.
The Gutierrezes still aren’t convinced of these findings. They say Martin had a contusion on the back of his head and that to this day, they have never been given a satisfactory answer as to what could have happened to him.
Nevertheless, police closed the case.
In the six years since Martin’s tragic passing, more bodies have been pulled out of Lady Bird Lake. In the last two years alone, there have been 14, many of them young men like Martin. The string of deaths has some locals convinced that there’s a serial killer stalking the streets of Austin. Some have even nicknamed this supposed murderer the “Rainey Street Ripper” after a street that runs along the lake.
There have been three bodies pulled from the lake this year, the most recent of which was an unidentified male found on Sept. 29, 2024. None of the deaths were deemed to be homicides by local authorities.
Police insist that there is no serial killer on the loose in the city. Most of the deaths have been ruled accidental.
Locals and, increasingly, the nation aren’t buying it.
Big changes on Rainey Street
At the turn of the last century, Rainey Street was strictly a residential area comprising of mostly single-story homes. A change to the zoning code in 2005 that allowed those homes to be converted into businesses paved the way for the downtown-adjacent neighborhood to undergo a dramatic transformation.
One by one, families, some of whom had been in the neighborhood for generations, moved out and bars and high-rise condominiums moved in. The road became known for its small houses and cottages that were home to some of Austin’s most popular bars and clubs.
By 2020, the transformation was complete. That year, a local news affiliate wrote about the last holdout from Rainey Street’s neighborhood days selling the house his grandparents had bought in the 1940s.
The house was eventually torn down. Where it once stood, a small local chain restaurant offers a “Mexican street taco experience.”
Today Rainey Street is a destination for well-heeled newcomers and tourists looking for pricey cocktails and glittering nightlife. When Formula 1’s international crowd comes to town every fall, this is where they play.
Condos soar above bars that are routinely packed with 21st century yuppies fantasizing about the day they can finally afford that Lamborghini.
A string of mysterious deaths has some wondering whether a killer is among them.
3 deaths within weeks
On July 14, 2022, 59-year-old Ricky Parks’ body was found in the lake.
Austin Emergency Management Services posted this update: “Water Rescue at 9 EAST AVE (Lady Bird Lake, 14:37). #ATCEMS & @AustinFireInfo are on scene of a reported person floating in the water, who is possibly deceased. Rescuers are making access by boat now, more information to follow.”
EMS used the word “rescue” rather than “recovery” because the presumption was that they were rescuing a living person. Once the person is determined to be deceased, either by the circumstances in which they’re located or if multiple hours have passed with no sign of them, it becomes a recovery.
Not long after, at 3:19pm CT, EMS posted, “FINAL Water Rescue at 9 EAST AVE: A Deceased on Scene pronouncement has been obtained for an adult patient. Crews are working on recovery & relocation of the victim back to shore. No further updates planned, no other information available.”
This case was one of the first that began to turn heads. However, what came in December raised new concerns in town.
On Dec. 10, 2022, Christopher Gutierrez’s body was found in the lake. (Christopher is no relation to Martin Gutierrez.) On Dec. 19, 2022, Josue Moreno’s body was also found in the lake. On Dec. 28, 2022, Kyle Thornton’s body was found in Lady Bird Lake. All three were recovered in the same area.
Austin police ruled no foul play was involved fairly quickly in the deaths of Gutierrez and Thornton. Many in the community aren’t buying it. To them, three is simply too many deaths for it to be a coincidence.
Of the three, Moreno’s death is the only one that police have at least some answers for. The 45-year-old was found dead in his truck submerged in the lake. He had gunshot wounds to his head. Police say that Moreno was killed by 18-year-old Joel Santiago Gonzalez-Paron in the early morning hours of Dec. 19.
Police records and affidavits say that Gonzalez-Paron and others were there to confront another group. Chaos broke out and people started running. Gonzalez-Paron told police, records show, that he shot at Moreno’s truck thinking someone they had a “problem” with was behind the wheel.
It remains unknown whether Moreno was involved in the confrontation or if he simply was driving by, which leaves some wondering what really happened that morning.
The case that changed everything
Although some were curious about the string of dead bodies turning up in Lady Bird Lake, it wasn’t until 30-year-old Jason John’s death that the city of Austin went on high alert.
John had lived in Austin for two years. According to his family, in the relatively short time he lived there, John fell in love with the city and it with him. So great was his love for Austin that his family buried him there even though he was originally from Port Chester, New York.
John had lots of friends, a girlfriend, and a keen sense of adventure that often found him out hiking, climbing, and exploring, his family says. During the pandemic, he worked remotely and traveled the country with his dog Ruffles. His mother described him as the voice of the family.
On the night he died, John was out with friends celebrating a promotion in the Rainey Street entertainment district. Then things took a horrific turn.
APD says John fell in Lady Bird Lake and died in the early morning of Feb. 5, 2023. It took over a week of searching to recover his body.
According to an affidavit from APD and medical examiner reports, a bystander near the lake noticed John vomiting into the water and subsequently falling in. The bystander told the authorities that they ran to a nearby hotel to call 911 and seek help. Records show that the call for help came in at 2:16am CT.
However, family members and others close to John insist there are some discrepancies in the accounts of what happened that night. They spent significant resources hiring private investigators and meeting with those identified as bystanders in police reports.
During the eight days he was missing, John’s family and friends did everything they could to get information about his whereabouts and what may have happened to him. They went on the news, canvassed the area, and took to social media to spread the word that he was missing, telling person after person what he looked like and where he may have been. They also personally searched the lake area each night looking for the man who was their son, brother, roommate, and friend.
At the time I was a reporter with KVUE News. John’s brother Rinju John told me that by the time they received the call informing them that a body had been found near where he was said to have gone in the lake, they had come to accept that he was dead.
Nevertheless, his family hasn’t let up since that terrible winter night he went missing. They’ve continued asking questions about what happened to him.
John’s death really started turning heads about the deaths in Lady Bird Lake.
Months later, the authorities released John’s autopsy and toxicology reports. Just like Martin Gutierrez five years prior, the medical examiner deemed his death an accidental drowning with no foul play involved. The report described his body as being in a condition expected of a drowning victim who had been in the water for many days.
“There were no significant external or internal traumatic findings found at autopsy or on postmortem radiology. The brain was mildly edematous (swollen),” the Travis County Medical Examiner’s Office report also stated.
“If there was any immediate public safety concerns, we would release that information,” Austin police Sgt. Lee Knouse said of speculation that there’s a serial killer.
According to his mother, Elsie, the first toxicology report only showed alcohol in his system. Based on a purported witness’ account, she had doubts, so she requested a second one.
The second toxicology exam again showed heightened levels of alcohol in his body and the trace of some cannabinoids, neither of which is particularly remarkable as both are widely used in Austin. However, one thing did stand out in that second report, Elsie said. The small amount of Gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, better known as GHB, found in his system. GHB is a central nervous system depressant and oftentimes used as a date rape drug.
The GHB raised a lot of red flags. Many wondered if John was drugged the night he died. The medical examiner disagreed. The report noted that GHB is naturally occurring during decomposition and said the amount found in John’s body aligns with that of normal production from natural causes.
Elsie isn’t buying it.
“Jason never used any drugs. I know that for sure,” she recently told the Daily Dot via email. “Despite the explanation of [the] ME about this, I feel someone either drugged him in the drink or someone threw him in the water.”
Elsie said her son wasn’t a swimmer and would never have gone near water if he was in his right mind.
Although his case has been closed, his family says they will never stop fighting for answers. Not only for John, but also every victim that has come before and after him. One year and nine months after his death, they continue to grieve deeply.
“The fabric of our tightly-knit loving family is now frayed. There is a piece of our hearts that has been excised and never can be replaced,” Elsie said.
Subsequent cases feel way too similar
Lady Bird Lake became a veritable graveyard after Jason John’s death.
The following month, Clifton Axel was found dead in the lake. There’s extremely limited information available to present day about his death. Police still have not determined how he died.
Rumors were already flying around Austin when yet another young man’s body turned up in Lady Bird Lake. This death thrust fears of a serial killer, whom locals began dubbing the Rainey Street Ripper, onto the national stage.
Jason John’s case had already drawn a lot of attention to the bodies washing up in Lady Bird Lake. Jonathan Honey’s death dialed it up significantly.
@blueotter777 #question from @blueotter777 On Saturday, April 15th, John Christopher Hays-Clark, 30, was recovered from Lady Bird Lake in Austin Texas. John brings the total of bodies pulled from the lake This year to 8! Victim’s families believe that there is more behind their deaths than accidental drownings. Most of the victims appear to have the same gender and age, which is typical of serial killers. People are very divided, some being very passionate in Facebook groups about concern for a serial killer, other people feel that these deaths are the results of perhaps a night out on the town, and a wrong turn. What’s your thoughts? #texasstrong #austintexas #texas #austin #ladybirdlake #ladybird #serialkillerstories #wrongturn #raineystreet #raineystreetripper #raineystreetkiller #accidentoronpurpose #sittingonthedockofthebay #blueotter777 #truestory #truecrimetok #crimejunkie ♬ (Sittin’ on) The Dock of the Bay [2020 Remaster] – Otis Redding
I covered Honey’s case. It felt unreal to see yet another 30ish-year-old man dead in the same area. Even more so when it was again ruled an accident with no foul play suspected.
Honey lived in the Washington, D.C. area and had come to town for a bachelor party. One night during the trip, he and his friends went to Rainey Street to celebrate.
Honey was last seen on March 31 after reportedly leaving the bars to get something to eat. He was never seen alive again.
A police search soon ensued. The next day, they found his body eerily close to the same locations where others had turned up.
@fordsanders #stitch with @fordsanders in just a months time there is now another person dead after a night out on Rainey Street here in Austin, TX. Rescue teams recovered 33-year-old Jonathan Honey’s body from Lady Bird Lake on Saturday April 1st. He was in Austin for a bachelor party. Such a tragic situation, prayers to his friends and family. #austin #austintx #ladybirdlake #raineystreet #texas #news #breakingnews #atx ♬ original sound – Ford Sanders
Honey’s death convinced people throughout Austin and beyond that there were too many similarities to believe local authorities’ claims that it was just a coincidence that men in their 30s keep meeting the same tragic fate in Lady Bird Lake after a night out with their friends on Rainey Street. How could this possibly keep happening?
Many people across Austin have even taken it into their own hands. They’ve done recreations and gone down to the lake themselves to see just how easy it would be to fall in. There is some fencing lined up on the lake; however, there are breaks in the fencing allowing for people to walk into the water. But even then, it is extremely shallow along the banks and still quite close to the trail, leaving many to wonder how it has become so common for so many “accidents” to happen.
Just like they did in Jason John’s case, authorities would later release the toxicology and autopsy reports for Honey. Like so many others before him, they deemed his death an accidental drowning.
The report described his condition as consistent with a drowning victim. The toxicology showed that he had alcohol, amphetamine (he was prescribed the drug for ADHD), and hydroxyzine in his system.
The hydroxyzine stood out right away.
Hydroxyzine has multiple uses as a remedy for allergies and allergic reactions and as an anxiety drug and sleep aid. It’s also been known to be found in street cocaine, but Honey didn’t have any of that drug in his system. However, the medical examiner report does show Cetirizine, also known as Zyrtec, in his system. The hydroxyzine would have been used as a standard antihistamine.
The report said Honey had a 2.5 x 1 cm blue contusion on his lower left eyelid and a few superficial lacerations. He also had a 0.8 cm contusion on the left side of his neck.
In spite of these injuries, authorities ruled Honey’s death an accidental drowning.
Weeks later, the body of 30-year-old John Christopher Hays-Clark washed up in the lake. Police once again ruled there was no foul play and closed out the investigation. His loved ones were skeptical. Months later, they were still looking for answers.
Thus far, little is known about the subsequent victims. That June, Mogga Dogale was found dead in the water. Other than his gender, at the time police didn’t release any information about his age, race, or ethnicity.
His was the fifth body in six months.
Austin police Sgt. Lee Knouse told the media that, in spite of the speculation and sheer number of mysterious deaths in the lake, the cases are not linked.
“If there was any immediate public safety concerns, we would release that information,” Knouse reportedly said.
Since then, there have been at least five more bodies found in Lady Bird Lake. One was female; at least two were men. Much to the frustration of the public, police have released little information.
As the questions and bodies pile up, national interest grows. Is the Rainey Street Ripper real? Or, like police have told the public, perhaps it’s just a coincidence that young men keep winding up dead in the lake.
“Dang the Rainey Ripper strikes again,” commented TikToker Westminster Gaby under a video of my coverage of another death at Lady Bird Lake.
At least one person who believes they may have been targeted by the Rainey Street Ripper survived. Jeff Jones told the Daily Mail that he was drugged and thrown into the lake in June 2023. He spent weeks in a coma.
“Whoever they may be just missed the target and I hit the ground, and luckily because of that I didn’t drown,” he told the outlet. “I just got lucky… Not many people can say they potentially survived a serial killer, so that’s a story I can tell, I guess.”
What’s the response from the Austin Police Department?
Most of the deaths have been deemed to have no foul play involved within hours of the bodies being recovered. The swiftness of these determinations has caused concern and confusion in Austin and, increasingly, throughout the nation.
Many online have accused APD of covering up the presence of a serial killer.
Asked about growing concern that it is hiding something, an APD spokesperson told me that the department has thoroughly investigated all the deaths in accordance with procedure and deemed only one was a homicide—that of Josue Moreno, who was shot while driving his truck and plunged into the lake.
“The Austin Police Department (APD) homicide unit investigates each death in the city to determine if it is suspicious. Following initial investigations, a medical examiner does a hands-on body exam to determine if there are any signs of physical injuries. The medical examiner then requests toxicology, which could take months,” they said.
“Through this process, one death near Lady Bird Lake in December 2022 was ruled a homicide. In that particular case, the victim was shot as he was driving by two groups that had been arguing. The other deaths in and around Lady Bird Lake are not considered suspicious due to the results of these investigations.”
Ripper fever
A Texas Monthly investigation found no evidence of a serial killer. Yet all over Austin’s happy hours, locals are talking about it. Rainey Ripper chatter informs local comedy.
The numbers keep the story alive in the local public consciousness.
The Son of Sam killer David Berkowitz shot eight people over the course of a year starting in 1976. The Zodiac Killer murdered five victims for certain, and injured two more from 1968-1969. (He claims to have murdered 37 in his letters.)
Here, the sheer uncertainty—in many minds—surrounding these cases has inspired people to come up with myriad theories. Is there a dating app connection? Is there a shadowy cabal of aggressors? Some even started investigating on their own.
Over the last two years, a large online community has grown of people who want to dive deeper into these mysteries.
In February 2023, Carissa Morgan created the Facebook group “Lady Bird Lake Serial Killer – True Crime.” The group quickly grew. Today there are over 90,000 members.
Via Messenger, Morgan said she created the group based on observations about news coverage of the deaths. She said it was never meant to become “something massive,” but decided to keep it going in the hopes of doing some good.
“We ran with it to give the families a voice,” Morgan said of herself and the other admins.
As the group grew, however, it quickly became overwhelming. It was impossible to please everyone, Morgan said, and it was plagued by complaints rather than good-faith efforts to help.
Morgan feels the group has the potential of doing some good, but that too many people tried to shoehorn the facts into conspiracy theories. Like that these deaths were associated with the Smiley Face Murder Theory, a.k.a. the Smiley Face Killings. It holds that 45 young men found dead in bodies of water in the Midwest from the ’90s to the 2010s were actually murdered by an organized group of serial killers. The theory has been purportedly debunked multiple times, including by the 2010 report by the Center for Homicide Research called “Drowning the Smiley Face Murder Theory.”
“It seemed to really make a lot of reporters take the issue less seriously,” Morgan said of attempts to associate the deaths in Lady Bird Lake with the Smiley Face Murder Theory.
She has now stepped down as an admin of the group. She says it got to be too much for her mental health. Being in charge of such a large group of people and that having few real answers about the deaths took a toll.
Morgan believes that Austin could do much more to prevent additional deaths, but questions whether local authorities have the will to do so.
“I believe someone there in Austin has the power to make real changes for the area, but knowing what I know and what the local government continues to prove; they likely will never put these cases at the top of their list and will continue to quickly label them as drownings while not addressing any other issue,” she said.
“City of Austin, what will you do to make your town safer??” Morgan added.
On Reddit, the true crime chatter is more skeptical.
“I am sorry for the families of these men. But I think people’s obsession with true crime, conspiracy, and using tragedy as entertainment has ballooned this into something it’s not,” a redditor wrote this summer.
Is anything being done downtown to improve safety?
From when I first started reporting on these deaths, APD and Austin city officials have maintained that there is no serial killer stalking Rainey Street.
But that still doesn’t answer the question of what is going so wrong by the lake that people—of those who have been identified, mostly young men—keep dying in those waters.
The community and families of the victims by and large agree that the city needs to implement additional safety measures by the lake and adjacent trail. This would include cameras, better lighting, more security, and potentially even a police presence to prevent additional deaths.
Elsie John, mother of Jason John, is one of the advocates for improvements.
“With the help of Jason’s many, many friends, we have reached out to politicians and lawmakers to look into multiple safety features around the lake and Rainey Street and we are working on it,” she said.
Some are resistant to such changes. The proposition of adding lighting met pushback from conservationists who argue that the lack of lighting is meant to preserve habitat for wildlife, including endangered species, that frequent the trail.
However, with so many human lives lost, many believe it’s time to update the trails and make them safer.
There is at least some movement to improve the safety of the trail. One of the largest updates comes from the Rainey Street Trailhead project. This project adds more surveillance, lighting and patrol down by the trail near Lady Bird Lake. It’s a welcome improvement, but some wonder if it’s enough.
Those who believe a serial killer is stalking Rainey Street aren’t convinced safety measures alone will stop the deaths.
Police and even some city officials have said over and over again that there is no serial killer in Austin. Many across the community and the nation aren’t buying it.
Some believe the perpetrator is drugging victims at nearby bars. Austin recently partnered with dozens of bars citywide to provide drug testing strips. It’s not clear whether the initiative has anything to do with the deaths.
People remain frustrated at the lack of answers.
“Something I feel very deeply happened to him that night. There was no indication of him trying to hurt himself or trying to commit suicide. He wasn’t in any secretive groups trying to meet up with secretive people,” said Whitney about her brother-in-law Martin Gutierrez.
“Some of these things circulating online are absolutely so out there and so flash that I just would really like to tell his story and how I knew him, he literally was with me every single day. I know him.”
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