Bizarre Crime of the Week : Investigation Discovery: Nichole Yegge's Killers Mutilated Her Body to Conceal Her Identity

September 16, 2008

Nichole Elizabeth Yegge, 17, was buried in a shallow grave in the Mojave Desert just outside Las Vegas in late July, less than a month before her eighteenth birthday, allegedly by a man and a young woman who feared being exposed for purportedly pimping out the runaway underage teenager who suffered bipolar disorder. The couple, Anne Osburn, 21, and Gabriel Yates, 31, were arrested last month for the teen's brutal murder. According to Las Vegas Metropolitan Police reports, the cops surreptitiously followed Yates when he returned to Yegge's desert gravesite after police received an early morning tipoff on July 28, 2008 from an acquaintance of Osburn's who resides in another state.

The tipster's friends, Gabriel Yates and Anne, were involved in the murder of a 17-year-old prostitute named 'Nikki,' whom Yates had allegedly been pimping out on Craig's List, according to the police report about the tipoff. The report stated that Yegge had been killed three days before police received the tip, which would have placed the date of Yegge's slaying on or about July 24th or July 25th. However, police later said that they had determined that the killing had occurred on Wednesday, July 23, 2008, following additional investigation. Yegge's killing was purportedly the result of a love triangle with the suspects, and had occurred after Yegge had threatened to tell the cops about what Yates and Osburn had been doing to her.

After the police secretly followed Yates north on U.S. 95 to the gravesite, near the turnoff to Kyle Canyon in an area east of Snow Mountain Golf Course on Saturday, August 2, 2008, they discovered Yegge's body at about 8:00 p.m., after Yates had left. Yates, perhaps sensing that he was being followed, had remained inside his car for a while upon arrival at the remote site, and then had driven away. Police then searched the area, and found the young girl's buried body. Yegge's body had been placed inside a hockey bag before being dumped in the shallow desert grave. Later, at the Clark County Coroner's Office, investigators discovered that Yegge's teeth had been knocked out and her tattoos sliced off. The cause of death was listed as asphyxiation.

"Their intent, as far as we know based on the type of damage to her body, was to prevent her from being identified if found," Homicide Sgt. Russell Shoemaker said.

Yegge had been in the Clark County foster care system until the end of May 2008, when she was declared a runaway. It was not clear when she hooked up with Yates and Osburn, parents of a newborn child.

Further investigation revealed that a Craig's List ad that had been placed under "Erotic Services" for the Las Vegas area included a contact number that turned out to belong to a cellular telephone that Yegge had been using. One of the advertisements also included Yegge's and Yates' photos.

"We do believe there was a relationship between the three of them," Shoemaker said, who declined to go into detail.

Yates drove a black BMW with a vanity license plate that read, "GO2GUY." A neighbor told police that she had seen Yegge sleeping inside Yates' BMW shortly before she disappeared. When the neighbor knocked on the car's window to check on Yegge, the teen indicated that she was fine even though "she did not look happy at all," according to the neighbor. The neighbor said that Yates, who purportedly worked for an escort service, came to her apartment the following day and thanked her for her concern.

"He just said the girl was working for him," the neighbor said. "He didn't use the word pimping, but close enough."

After the police had received the tip from Osburn's acquaintance, they went to Osburn's and Yates' apartment, located on Koval Lane not far from The Strip, and told the couple that they were investigating a report of a missing person and named Yegge as the subject of the report. Yates and Osburn acknowledged that they knew Yegge, but denied that she had lived at their apartment. They told the cops, however, that she had visited with them recently.

During police shadowing of the couple using sophisticated surveillance equipment, detectives purportedly heard Osburn state that Yates had struck Yegge. They also heard Yates talking about how he had worked in a slaughterhouse as a teenager skinning animals, and that blood did not bother him. He also stated that he knew how to get rid of a body, according to the surveillance report.

The report also stated that Nikki had begun to cry, and told the couple that she was leaving and was going to tell the police that Osburn and Yates were pimping out an under-age girl. Nikki started for the door and Yates hit her again, knocking her to the floor. Osburn then choked Yegge to death. The information in the surveillance report was apparently culled from statements made by Osburn and Yates at various times while they were being observed and listened to by the police, but it was not always clear to whom they were speaking.

Yates and Osburn were arrested on Sunday, August 3, 2008 at the Texas Station casino on North Rancho Road in Las Vegas, and charged with first-degree kidnapping and first-degree murder. They were held without bail at the Clark County Detention Center.

After the arrests were made, according to a police report, Yates allegedly stated that "the police had the body and had the right man."

Yates apparently had been charged with murder before, police learned. He was 18 and in the Army when he was suddenly discharged from Fort Riley, Kansas, after less than a year of service, on August 18, 1995. The reason for the discharge was not known, but the same day that he was discharged police from a small town in Florida showed up and arrested him in connection the beating and drowning death of a 13-year-old boy two years earlier, in 1993. Originally from Nebraska, Yates, who went by the nickname of "Ghost," had been living with his grandmother in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, at the time the 13-year-old, Nicholas Maxwell Bishop, was slain during a gang initiation ritual. Although Bishop's fingernails yielded a small amount of material that matched Yates' DNA, Yates was acquitted by a jury of killing the boy.

As this bizarre case continues to develop, Investigation Discovery will keep you informed.

Photo Credits: Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department