The Oliver 3—Zi’Ariel Robinson-Oliver, age 9, A’Miyah Hughes, age 8, and Te’Mari Robinson-Oliver, age 5—were reported missing in Atlanta, Texas, on July 28, 2022. Around nine o’clock in the evening, Paris Propps, the kids’ cousin who was caring for the three sisters and their brothers while their mother was at work, reported the girls missing. The three remains were all discovered in a neighboring pond some hours later, on July 29.
Authorities first said there had been a drowning. But the Cass County District Attorney’s Office said in March that a murder investigation is ongoing, almost eight months after the youngsters were last seen alive.
“Autopsy investigations found signs of strangling and determined that all three girls’ deaths were the result of murder. The Cass County District Attorney’s Office’s press statement, which Yahoo News was able to get, said that the girls also had facial lacerations.
Advocates are now interjecting to demand explanations. The New Black Panther Nation’s leader, Minister Quanell X, flew four hours from Houston to conduct a news conference in Cass County on April 3. He then asked that the FBI and Department of Justice launch an investigation. An inquiry from Yahoo News for comment has received no response from the FBI.
During the press conference, Quanell X sat next to the Oliver sisters’ mother. She was informed that the girls drowned, but she always had a sneaking suspicion that they did not. The autopsies, it turns out, validated her assumptions,” Quanell told Yahoo News.
The killings are being looked into by the Cass County District Attorney’s Office, Texas Rangers, and sheriff’s office. According to a statement acquired by Yahoo News from the district attorney’s office, “Multiple witness statements have been obtained, DNA testing is ongoing, and the investigation will continue.” A spokesman for the office refused to give any information when Yahoo News contacted them for clarification.
With a population of 28,539 as of the 2022 U.S. Census, Cass County is too small, according to supporters, to adequately investigate three killings.
They were assumed to have drowned as a result of a phony investigation, a careless investigation, and investigators who clearly lacked the tools and training required to properly handle an investigative crime scene, according to Quannell.
The months-long time delay should have been averted, according to experts, but investigators are still looking for potential perpetrators.
According to David Thomas, a professor of forensic studies at Florida Gulf Coast University, “the usual time frame [for autopsies] depends, but I would say within two weeks,” he told Yahoo News.
When it comes to tiny communities, though, “they send those autopsies off to a whole different county, hours away from that county to do the autopsy,” Cannell said.
The autopsy results are just one aspect of the problem, however. Thomas claims that when the girls were discovered in the pond, more might have been done.
“They sat and they assumed that they had drowned,” Thomas told Yahoo News. “It wouldn’t make any sense for three persons to perish in the same area, at around the same time. “If it had been Gabby Petito, everything would have stopped,”
Authorities were informed of a crime shortly after the occurrence, according to a recent story in Revolt Black News weekly, but they just recently made the information public last month. The newspaper said, “However, they didn’t say why they delayed sharing the information.”
The bruises on the girls’ cheeks and necks, according to Quannell, “would have ultimately allowed any skilled investigators when they recovered the bodies from the [pond] to see that this was more than some accidental drowning.”
The probe, in Quanell’s opinion, is not a top priority since all of the young girls are Black. “In my opinion, Cass County is proceeding as it has in the past when looking into cases of injustice and homicide that involve Black victims. Because there aren’t three young white children involved, in my opinion, they aren’t treating this issue seriously.
Brittany Lewis, the co-founder of Research in Action, told Yahoo News in March that “national statistics tell us that over 60,000 Black women are missing, and Black women are twice as likely than they appear to be victims of homicide.”
Now, according to experts, the inquiry would be considerably more difficult because of the significant gap in time. Former Kansas City, Missouri, police officer and professor of criminal justice at Michigan State University David Carter told Yahoo News, “That eight-month time gap is devastating.”
“It is tougher the longer it takes between when the deaths are located and when the inquiry starts. Finding suspects, witnesses, and evidence is all more difficult to come by, according to Carter.
There is no justification, according to Carter, a former law enforcement officer, for the investigation’s holdup. Carter added, “I’m genuinely baffled as to why a criminal inquiry wasn’t opened right away. Advocates stress that the perpetrators of these atrocities are still at large while police look into the matter.
Thomas answered, “They may be anywhere. “But I would say that the likelihood that they knew that pond was there would probably give you an indication that it might be somebody local or someone that’s very familiar with the area.” “This sounds like a very, very targeted personal crime,” Carter said.
In the almost one-year-old case, there have been no arrests, but more people are demanding justice. Celebrities like Viola Davis and Niecy Nash posted a montage video of the Oliver 3 on social media recently, along with civil rights lawyer Ben Crump. Black Girl Gone, a true crime podcast that explores the disappearance of Black girls and women, produced the video.
A child murderer. There is a serial murderer out there. one who didn’t hesitate to kill three kids. And you will murder more people if you kill three. Particularly if you think you can get away with it as the offender has, Quanell added. As they continue to fight for the Oliver sisters’ rights, Quanell and the New Black Panther Nation want to hold a town hall in Cass County on April 26.
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