Before Jack the Ripper, Austin had its own unidentified nighttime killer.

In 1884 and 1885, a series of brutal attacks terrorized Austin, Texas. Black women working as domestic servants were among the earliest victims. Their work placed them inside other people’s homes, but proximity offered little protection.

In this installment of If It Happened Now, Steph examines the Austin Ripper case, also known as the Servant Girl Annihilator murders. Who were the people behind the sensational name? How did race, gender, newspaper coverage, and investigative limitations shape the response—and the story we remember?

Then we bring the case into the present. Could DNA, surveillance cameras, and connected investigations have changed the outcome? And would the women targeted first receive the attention needed to stop the attacks sooner?

“The darkness helped him move. Indifference gave him time.”

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Join the conversation: If these attacks happened now, what would make the biggest difference: better technology or a faster response to the first victims?

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In this episode of Murder in the Black, Steph follows the urgent, multi-state search to bring Carlesha home. A witness who called police twice. Detectives who promised her mother they would find her. An ATM transaction, a dealership decal, and a GPS tracker that helped investigators close the distance.

At the center of every development was Carlesha: resisting, paying attention, and making decisions to survive nearly three days in captivity.

As we prepare for our new series, If It Happened Now, this case raises a question: With more cameras and digital evidence available today, how much still depends on someone recognizing a clue—and acting before it’s too late?

Content note: Discussion of kidnapping, violence, and captivity.

CHAPTERS
00:00 A camera captures the abduction
01:24 A promise to Carlesha’s mother
03:19 The attack and the witness who stayed
05:20 Carlesha fights back
07:13 Following the evidence
10:27 The search reaches Maryland
12:20 Identifying Delvin Barnes
13:38 A dealership connection changes the search
15:32 Her family waits for answers
17:56 A tracker reveals a location
18:26 Closing in—and bringing Carlesha home
21:20 The people behind every breakthrough
23:13 When evidence becomes public spectacle
25:12 The guilty plea and sentence
27:37 If it happened now
30:59 Missing Black women, urgency, and unequal attention
31:56 Centering Carlesha’s survival

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For the finale of Murder in the Black: Unsolved Mysteries, Steph examines two cases in which recovering a person’s body did not answer the most important question: What happened to them?

Ricky McCormick was found dead near a Missouri field in June 1999. Inside his pockets were two pages covered in handwritten letters, numbers and symbols. More than a decade later, the FBI publicly released the pages after its own cryptanalysts were unable to decipher them. But members of Ricky’s family questioned whether he could have written the notes at all.

Were the pages connected to Ricky’s death, a private form of shorthand—or simply an unexplained distraction from the investigation?

Sixteen years later, Henry McCabe disappeared after spending an evening with friends in Minnesota. During his final known hours, Henry’s wife received a disturbing voicemail filled with unusual sounds and fragmented speech. His body was eventually recovered from Rush Lake, but the discovery did not explain how he got there or what happened after he was dropped off that night.

The coded pages and unsettling recording have become the most recognizable details in these cases. But neither provides a complete story.

In this episode, Steph separates what is documented from what has been repeated online and returns to the question still facing both families: How did Ricky McCormick and Henry McCabe get from their final known locations to the places where they were found?

Timestamps

00:01 — Ricky McCormick’s mysterious handwritten pages
01:01 — Introducing the Unsolved Mysteries finale
02:29 — Why Ricky’s cause of death remained undetermined
03:27 — Reconstructing Ricky’s final movements
05:48 — Ricky’s family questions whether he wrote the pages
06:16 — Addressing Ricky’s criminal history
07:11 — The Florida trip and concerns that Ricky was afraid
08:38 — Hospital visits, Ricky’s final call and his last reported sighting
09:37 — Aunt Gloria remembers the last time she saw Ricky
11:52 — Decomposition and the limitations of the autopsy
13:16 — The FBI’s description of the mysterious pages
15:32 — Repeated characters, possible patterns and the absence of a translation
17:40 — The FBI asks the public for help
19:58 — Ricky’s relatives challenge the coded-writing narrative
22:08 — Investigative leads that never produced conclusive evidence
23:55 — How the notes became the center of Ricky’s story
26:41 — Introducing Henry McCabe
27:40 — Henry’s life, family and career
29:06 — The night out and the disputed gas-station drop-off
31:33 — The disturbing voicemail
33:36 — Search efforts and changes to the public timeline
35:31 — Henry’s body is recovered from Rush Lake
36:30 — Probable drowning without a complete explanation
38:50 — Questions about the drop-off, Henry’s keys and his wallet
41:43 — Remembering Henry beyond the recording
43:10 — Parallels to other unexplained deaths
45:03 — Closing the Unsolved Mysteries series

If you have information

If you have information concerning Ricky McCormick’s death, contact Crime Stoppers at 866-371-8477.

When discussing Ricky’s handwritten pages, focus on genuine handwriting samples or recognizable habits rather than unsupported online theories. A proposed translation is not evidence unless it can be independently verified.

Do you believe Ricky’s notes were connected to his death? What do you hear when you listen to Henry’s final recording? And which case from this three-part series stayed with you the most?

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