North Little Rock police say they are closer than ever before to making arrests in a triple homicide that claimed the lives of two of Annette Jones children in 1994.
“I lost two children, I still have that emptiness in my heart,” she says.
For Jones, the pain of losing Iris and Michael is so strong it feels like yesterday.
“I couldn’t believe it, I lost it
But it was 19 years ago, August 6th 1994.
File video footage captured emotions erupting behind the crime scene tape on East 7th Street.
That’s where police found the bodies of 21-year-old Iris Jones, her brother, 24-year-old Michael Jones and 31-year-old Betsy McGuire. All three had been shot in the head, reportedly after leaving a party.
After the murders, police knocked on doors and chased down leads. Jones even developed her own suspect.
“I thought about just getting in my car and waiting and waiting for him to come home and just shoot him in his leg somewhere, God let me know that is not the way,” she says.
So she waited and over the year the case, like the neighborhood nicknamed “Red Zone” went quiet, until 2013.
“A couple months ago we got really active,” says cold case investigator John Rehrauer.
He says the city’s cold case unit refocused on the case and found other changes over time.
The apartment where the murders happened is gone, but so are some people’s fears about talking to police.
“We know there were drugs involved and money involved and relationships involved and maybe not exactly what they thought in 94,” he added.
Detectives say they are closing in on suspects and think they’re just one tip away from bringing Jones the bittersweet closure she’s been waiting for.
“They gone be caught, I’ll never give up,” she says.
The North Little Rock Police Department is encouraging people with any information about this crime to come forward. Police are now offering a substantial monetary reward for information in this case.