Heather Strube was putting her toddler into his car seat outside a Snellville Target when a person with a mustache and bushy hair approached. They started arguing.
“Help,” Strube said to a passing motorist before she was shot in the head on April 26, 2009. She was 25.
The mustachioed suspect turned out to be Joanna Hayes, her mother-in-law, investigators said. Hayes was arrested in October 2009 and a jury found her guilty. She is serving a life sentence.
NBC’s “Dateline” will feature the case at 9 p.m. Friday. The two-hour episode, called “Deadly Swap,” includes an interview with a lead detective along with family and friends.
“I did not plan to do another one of these, but the producer was very caring and persuasive,” Buddy Allen, Strube’s father, said in a social media post. “I know those of you who knew Heather or close friends would have wanted to know about this chance to remember the wonderful person she was and what a gift from God that we believed her to be.”
The Strubes were going through a divorce at the time of the shooting. They used the Target parking lot to exchange their 18-month-old son, Carson, because Heather Strube felt it was a safe location, her family later said.
Investigators ruled out Steven Strube as a suspect because surveillance cameras showed him leaving the parking lot prior to the shooting. But video from the store indicated the attacker could have been a woman, and a white pickup truck witnesses saw at the scene of the crime was similar to one driven by Hayes. The shooting was not captured on camera.
Credit: AJC file
Credit: AJC file
In the courtroom, jurors heard a recorded phone conversation between Hayes and her son after police showed Steven Strube the parking lot video.
“Mom, it looks like you. It looks just like you. Walks like you,” Strube said, sobbing. “Why did you do it?”
Hayes replied, “I didn’t, Steven.”
Strube continued to press his mother, but her response stayed the same.
“Steven, what did I have to gain by doing that?” Hayes said.
Strube replied, “Mom, I don’t know. Did you do it? Seriously, do not lie to me.”
Hayes insisted, “Steven, no, I did not.”
Hayes was sentenced to life in prison with the chance of parole.
Credit: Bob Andres
Credit: Bob Andres
“I’ve never harmed anyone or anything in my entire life,” Hayes insisted, tears streaming down her face, after her conviction. “It hurts me to hear others say that we had a strained relationship, because we did not. . . . I did not commit this offense because I loved her just as much as anyone.”
Heather Strube’s parents, Mary and Buddy Allen, got custody of her son following the slaying. Hayes’ conviction brought tears of relief to their eyes. A relative mouthed to Mary Allen, “No more fear,” after the verdict was read, and she nodded in response.
“I believe they convicted the right person,” Mary Allen said outside the courthouse. “I will live my life cautiously. But we will live life, because my grandson deserves a full life.”
In March 2013, Hayes’s conviction was upheld by the state Supreme Court. She is in custody at Pulaski State Prison for women in Hawkinsville, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections.
Mary Allen died in 2014 and Buddy Allen is raising his now-teenage grandson.
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