Hi-Fi murders

The Hi-Fi murders were the torture of five people resulting in three deaths during a robbery at the Hi-fi Shop, a home audio store in Ogden, Utah, on the evening of April 22, 1974.

Several men entered the Hi-fi Shop shortly before closing time and began taking hostages.

They forced their victims to drink corrosive drain cleaner, which the perpetrators believed would fatally poison their hostages, but instead caused burns to their mouths and throats.

Further violence included kicking a pen into an ear and the brutal rape of an eighteen-year-old girl, before three of the victims were fatally shot.

The two surviving victims were left with life-changing injuries.

Police only had enough evidence to convict three enlisted United States Air Force airmen: Dale Selby Pierre, William Andrews, and Keith Roberts; the three others involved were never caught.

Pierre and Andrews were both sentenced to death and executed for murder and aggravated robbery, while Roberts, who had remained in a getaway vehicle, was merely convicted of robbery.

The crime became notorious for its extreme violence and later accusations of racial bias in the Utah judiciary.

On April 22, 1974, Pierre, Andrews, Roberts, and three other men drove in two vans to the Hi-Fi Shop at 2323 Washington Boulevard, Ogden, just before closing time.

Four of the group entered the shop brandishing handguns, while Roberts and another man remained with the vehicles.

Two employees, Stanley Walker, aged 20, and Michelle Ansley, aged 18, were in the store at the time and were taken hostage.

Pierre and Andrews took the two into the store's basement and bound them.

The gang then began robbing the store.

Later, a 16-year-old boy, Cortney Naisbitt, who dropped by to thank Walker for allowing him to park his car in the store's parking lot earlier that day as he ran an errand next door, was also taken hostage and tied up in the basement with Walker and Ansley.

Later that evening, Orren Walker, Stanley Walker's 43-year-old father, became worried that his son had not returned home and went to the store.

Cortney Naisbitt's mother, Carol Peterson Naisbitt, also arrived at the shop later that evening looking for her son, who was late getting home.

Both Orren Walker and Carol Naisbitt were taken hostage and tied up in the basement.

They had contained a total of 5 hostages in the basement.

With five people now held hostage in the basement, Pierre told Andrews to get something from their van.

Andrews returned with a bottle in a brown paper bag, from which Pierre poured a cup of Drano-brand drain cleaner.

Pierre ordered Orren to administer it to the other hostages, but he refused, and was bound, gagged, and left face-down on the basement floor.

Pierre and Andrews then propped the hostages into sitting positions and forced them to drink the Drano, telling them it was vodka laced with sleeping pills.

It immediately caused blisters on the victims' lips, burnt their tongues and throats, and peeled the flesh around their mouths.

Ansley, still begging for her life, was forced to drink the Drano, although Orren said she coughed less than the other victims.

Pierre and Andrews tried to duct-tape the hostages' mouths shut to hold quantities of drain cleaner in and to silence their screams, but the oozing blisters prevented the adhesive from sticking.

Orren was the last to be given the Drano, but seeing what was happening to the other hostages, allowed it to pour out of his mouth and then mimicked the convulsions and screams of his son and other hostages.

Pierre became angry because the deaths were taking too long, and were too loud and messy, so he shot Carol and Cortney Naisbitt in the backs of their heads, killing Carol but leaving Cortney alive.

Pierre then shot at Orren Walker but missed.

He fatally shot Stanley before again shooting at Orren, this time grazing the back of his head.

Pierre took Ansley to the far corner of the basement, forced her at gunpoint to remove her clothes, then repeatedly raped her after telling Andrews to leave for 30 minutes.

Afterwards, he allowed her to use the bathroom while he watched, then dragged her, still naked, back to the other hostages, threw her on her face, and fatally shot her in the back of the head.

According to Orren's testimony, her last words were "I am too young to die."

Andrews and Pierre noted that Orren was still alive, so Pierre mounted him, wrapped a wire around his throat, and tried to strangle him.

When this failed, Pierre and Andrews inserted a ballpoint pen into Orren's ear.

Pierre stomped it until it punctured his eardrum, broke, and exited his throat.

Pierre and Andrews went upstairs, finished loading equipment into their van, and left.

The victims included the following five individuals, three of whom were murdered.

Each of the victims were bound, forced to drink liquid Drano, and were later shot.

Nonetheless, two individuals, now deceased, survived their injuries.

The bodies were discovered almost three hours later, when Orren's wife and other son came to the store looking for them.