The deaths of Janson Tate Rowland (November 7, 1970 – July 26, 1988)[1][2] and Terrie Shawn Trosper (February 27, 1964 – May 30, 1991),[3] two siblings in Childress, Texas, occurred in 1988 and 1991, respectively.
[4] On the evening of July 26, 1988, the body of 17-year-old Tate Rowland was discovered hanging from a horse apple tree on a dirt road outside of Childress, Texas by his friend, Chad Johnston.
[11] According to the district attorney, there were also eyewitness reports of strangers attempting to pick up children from the local schools in the fall of 1988, and multiple phone calls were received each day by the police department claiming Rowland had been murdered due to his affiliations with a Satanic cult.
[10] Though Rowland's body was too decomposed to make conclusive statements about the hanging as a suicide, there were levels of Elavil found in his remains, and the coroner claimed to have been 70% sure that the death was a homicide.
[10] Trosper's body was also exhumed in late October, and the second autopsy, performed in December, revealed contusions on her thigh as well as evidence that she had been smothered to death.