Fresh fears of Rainey Street ripper grip Austin after body is found by Lady Bird Lake, the 13th since 2022 - as cops try to reassure residents
Police in Texas are struggling to keep a lid on fears that the 'Rainey Street Ripper' has struck again after insisting the latest suspected victim must have killed himself.
The bodies of 11 men and two women have been recovered from a short stretch of the Colorado River in Austin in just the last two years, with police insisting that only one raised any suspicion of foul play.
But skepticism at the official line has reached new heights cafter police announced that the latest victim had died from 'blunt force trauma' after being found on Friday.
Hours later they issued a hasty correction claiming that new evidence suggested he had shot himself in the head.
'The deceased suffered an apparent self inflicted gunshot wound,' they tweeted. 'This is NOT being investigated as a Homicide.'
Hours after the latest body was found on Friday, Austin Police Department spokesman Austin Zarling revealed the cause of death to be a 'blunt force trauma' to the head
Two days later the police department said that the man had in fact shot himself in the head
The latest body was found despite more than a year's worth of safety improvement works at the mile-long stretch of the river from the Lamar Boulevard Bridge to Lady Bird Lake along which all 13 victims have been found.
Police responded at 5.30pm on Friday to reports of a man with life-threatening injuries found on a path next to the river at Waller Beach, right in the middle of the mile-long stretch.
The man was pronounced dead within 15 minutes of being found by emergency services, and thick pools of blood were left between the path and the water's edge.
'All investigative steps being taken are routine measures,' the department's Austin Zarling told a media briefing
'At this time this is being considered an isolated incident and there is no known threat to the general public.
'I spoke to homicide detectives and there is no serial killer at this time.
'At least we don't believe there is one.'
Police have concluded that most of the deaths are likely accidental drownings due to the lake's proximity to popular nightlife spots.
These include that of Ricky Parks, 59, whose body was the first to be found in July 2022.
Jeff Jones (pictured in hospital with his sister Amy) after he plummeted 25ft off a bridge in Austin, and believes he could have been pushed by the 'Rainey Street ripper'
Jones wasn't able to leave hospital for 17 days while his older sister Amy dropped everything to fly in and stay by his bedside, then took him to her home in New Hampshire to recover
The deaths of Christopher Gutierrez, Kyle Thornton, 56, and Christopher Hays-Clark 30, were also not deemed suspicious.
Two of the deceased, Jason John, 30, and Jonathan Honey, 33, were deemed to have drowned accidentally. Both men were last seen on Rainey Street.
One man Josue Moreno was shot while driving and his vehicle plunged into the reservoir, cops said.
The death of Clifton Axtell, 46, who was found in March 2023 was ruled as 'undetermined'. The remaining bodies were not being investigated as homicides.
But investigators have been dogged by persistent claims that a homophobic killer is targeting gay men frequenting the nightspots of the nearby Rainey Street area.
In April a bartender on the entertainment strip has claimed a patron told him he was the rumored Rainey Street Ripper attacking men in the nearby waterway as two more bodies were pulled from the water.
Posting on Reddit he recalled that the man 'suddenly started talking about 'killing homos' from [Lady Bird Lake] that he found from [Rainey Street]'.
'He was clearly angry and was saying it in a low voice. But I know what I heard... Do people lie about these things?' the bartender added.
He described his client as a white man in his 40s, about 5'10 tall with a muscular build, brownish light hair, and stubble.
That same month a man who was drugged and plummeted 25ft off a nearby bridge, narrowly missing certain drowning, told Dailymail.com he believed he had been attacked by the ripper.
Cliff Axtell, 40, was found in Lady Bird Lake on March 5 after he went missing near Stubb's in downtown on February 25. His death has been ruled 'undetermined'
Four bodies were found in Austin's Lady Bird Lake in 2023 including, 33-year-old Jonathan Honey (pictured) who was found dead on April 1
Jason John, 30, was found on February 13,2023 after he was last seen on Rainey Street a week earlier. His parents believe there is more to the story behind his disappearance
The death of dad Christopher Hays-Clark, 30, (pictured with son) was not deemed to be suspicious
Jeff Jones, 38, was on a bachelor party trip to Austin with a dozen friends from his home in Boston on June 23 last year.
He woke up in hospital more than two weeks later with metal rods holding his back together and doctors found the date-rape drug Rohypnol in his system.
Whoever they may be just missed the target and I hit the ground, and luckily because of that I didn't drown,' he explained.
'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.'
One Facebook group alone has attracted 90,000 followers to its updates on the deaths, but police have continued to insist that the deaths are not linked.
Former forensic director with the Austin Police Department, Mark Gillespie, previously stressed in an interview with KVUE that the public should believe the police when they say that there is no foul play.
'They're looking for foul play, and so when APD comes out with the statement that at the current time, they don't suspect foul play, I promise you they were looking for it, and they were looking very hard for it, so I respect that,' Gillespie said.
In an interview with KXAN, Dr. Carsten Andresen of St. Edward's University, said that the rumors around the Lady Bird Lake deaths are similar to conspiracy theories being spread in cities across the country.
Rainey Street (above) is a vibrant area in Austin known for its night life and offerings of bars, food trucks and restaurants. Lady Bird Lake is about 1.8 miles, or 35-minute walk away from the street. There are no cameras around the lake
'Human nature has always looked at things and sort of looked for patterns that may or may not exist. But also, social media and the ability to just sort of put these rumors online and sort of have them go out like wildfire,' he said.
Andresen pointed out that Austin has a reputation as a city where people go to drink and cut loose.
'I don't think that we've seen anything that would lead one to conclude that there's a serial killer out there. But we do know that people drink to excess in Austin, and that men often engage in at-risk behavior,' he added.
