The Night Before Halloween, the upcoming episode of Dateline: Secrets Uncovered, will go in-depth on the spine-chilling murder of 21-year-old Robin Hoynes. Hoynes’ murderer, a former worker at the Kentucky Fried Chicken, eluded capture for more than two decades.
Learn more about the murder, the events that led up to it, and the challenges the victim’s family and the Torrance community experienced in the aftermath. The show, which airs on Wednesday at 8 p.m., will also explain how a tiny piece of foam became crucial to concluding the case after 23 years.
On August 3, 2022, watch the 65th instalment of the most recent season of Dateline: Secrets Uncovered. The episode’s official synopsis is as follows:
“It takes an unique eye to see the object that’s out of place at a crime scene; in this case, that thing looks so insignificant, no one even knows what it is or what it signifies; it takes a team of determined investigators almost two decades to find out,” the book’s subtitle reads.
Robin Hoynes was murdered in 1984
Dateline: Secrets Uncovered – Who was Robin Hoynes, and what happened to her?
In 1984, Robin Lucille Hoynes, a Whittier native, was 21 years old and employed by Kentucky Fried Chicken in Torrance, California, as an assistant manager. She was brutally murdered on October 30, 1984, by William Charles Marshall, a former coworker.
Hoynes allowed Marshall in after hours the night of the murder as she was completing paperwork on the pretence that he was picking up his briefcase and removing his uniform after being dismissed on suspicion of stealing money. Hoynes was assassinated in a surprise attack by Marshall, who had come to loot the location.
The victim in the murder of Robin Hoynes had two back stab wounds, one of which was fatal and the other possibly fatal, according to the medical examiner. At the time of her death or shortly after, her throat was slashed.
Cheryl Fuller, another assistant manager at the fast food business who had switched shifts with Hoynes that evening, found Hoynes’ body the next day.
How Robin Hoynes’ killer was caught
Although William Marshall was the main suspect in the killing of Hoynes, no charges were brought against him at the time, thus he was taken into custody and eventually freed. In addition, Marshall’s alibi failed to place him at the crime scene that evening.
Marshall managed to elude justice for more than 20 years with the aid of his then-girlfriend and the lack of adequate evidence to prosecute him.
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His ex-girlfriend Yvonne Williams also gave evidence against him in court and described the crime in detail. Back in 1984, Marshall had informed her of the stabbing and requested her to stand in for him. After Hoynes’ death, the drug-using pair continued to be together for another three years.
After four weeks of testimony, a jury ultimately found Marshall guilty of killing Hoynes in 2007, and he was given a life sentence without the possibility of parole.