Rachel Pittman Murders 3 In Texas

Rachel Pittman was a sixteen year old living in Texas when she would murder a mother and her two young children

According to court documents Rachel Pittman would go over to a home where she was always welcome. Once inside of the door Rachel would stab to death the woman and her two young children: Amanda Doss, 34, Guinevere Doss, 11, and Texas Johnson,8,.

After she stabbed the victims to death Rachel Pittman would dose the victims in a flammable liquid and set them on fire. Pittman would destroy the clothes that she was wearing as well as the knife used

The triple murder would go unsolved for over a month

Rachel Pittman would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for thirty years

Rachel Pittman Current Information

SID Number: 08932389

TDCJ Number: 01830034

Name: PITTMAN,RACHEL

Race: W

Gender: F

Age: 31

Maximum Sentence Date: LIFE SENTENCE

Current Facility: MURRAY

Projected Release Date: LIFE SENTENCE

Parole Eligibility Date: 2041-08-12

Inmate Visitation Eligible: YES

Rachel Pittman Case

A Redwater, TX teenager accused of killing a mother and her two children has taken a plea deal.

Rachel Pittman, now 18, was charged as an adult with capital murder in the May 2011 deaths of 34-year-old Amanda Doss and 11-year-old Guinevere Doss and was facing a separate murder charge for 8-year-old Texas Johnson. Autopsies confirmed all three died from violent injuries prior to the fire, which investigators believe was set to destroy evidence of the murders.

Because she was 16 at the time of the crime, Pittman would not have been eligible for the death penalty if convicted, but she did face life in prison.

Trial was set to begin next week in Rusk County, but on Friday in Bowie County District Court, Pittman withdrew her insanity defense and plead guilty to two counts of the lesser charge of first degree murder.

Bowie County District Judge Leon Peseck, Jr. sentenced Pittman to two life sentences, with the possibility for parole after 30 years. She will not be able to appeal her sentence. Her attorney, Clifton “Scrappy” Holmes, says the deal gives her more privileges in prison than she would have had if she had gone to trial and been convicted on the capital murder charge. “This young lady entered a plea that, under the circumstances, we feel was the proper conclusion,” Holmes says.

Pittman was tearful while on the stand answering questions before the sentencing, explaining that she did not agree at first to the deal, but changed her mind after seeing photos of the victims. Pittman also hung her head down and cried as Amanda Doss’ father tearfully spoke, saying that Amanda had trusted her, recounting how they had provided refuge for the teenager when she ran away from home and even invited her to Thanksgiving dinner.

In a statement released by the Bowie County District Attorney’s Office, District Attorney Jerry Rochelle said, “The Bowie County District Attorney’s Office is relieved that this will conclude this case and spare the victim’s family the burden of a jury trial. The district attorney’s office respects the family’s decision to allow the defendant to plea to a life sentence and avoid both a trial as well as any possibility of years of appellate battle. Our hearts and prayers go out to the families. We hope this brings them closure and some sense of justice.”

Investigators and prosecutors have never released any details on what may have been the motive for the killings.

Redwater teen takes plea deal in triple murder

Rachel Pittman Video

Watch Rachel Pittman Video – Teens Who Kill – Real Cases of Teen Violence

Watch Rachel Pittman Murders 3 In Texas – YouTube

Rachel Pittman: The Texas Teen Who Planned A Triple Murder

Who is Rachel Pittman? Rachel Nicole Pittman is a Texas woman convicted of murdering her neighbor Amanda Doss, 34, and Doss’s two children – Guinevere Doss, 11, and Texas Johnson, 8 – on May 11, 2011 in Redwater, Texas. She was 16 at the time.

Why did she do it? Pittman told investigators she believed an adult friend wanted her to kill Doss. Mental health experts later diagnosed her with emerging psychosis and paranoid schizophrenia, noting delusional religious beliefs and “confirmations” from TV and billboards.

Where is Rachel Pittman now? As of 2026, she is incarcerated at the Hobby Unit (a women’s prison in Marlin, Texas) serving two concurrent life sentences. Her parole eligibility date is August 12, 2041 – after 30 years.

Did she get the death penalty? No. She was 16, so Texas law barred capital punishment. She pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder to avoid a capital murder trial.

The Crime That Haunted Bowie County

Redwater, Texas, population 1,000, sits on Farm to Market Road 991 near Texarkana. It’s the kind of place where neighbors babysit each other’s kids and leave doors unlocked.

On May 11, 2011, at 3 a.m., 16-year-old Rachel Pittman walked the short distance from her home to Amanda Doss’s house carrying a four-to-five-inch wooden-handled kitchen knife hidden in her shorts and a two-liter soda bottle filled with gasoline.

What happened next was not a teenage impulse. According to court documents, Pittman “extensively planned out the murder to the smallest details.”

She knocked. Amanda, who knew Pittman as her children’s babysitter, invited her in. They talked. Then Pittman stood as if to leave – and instead attacked.

Amanda was stabbed to death. Then Pittman used the same knife to murder 11-year-old Guinevere and 8-year-old Texas in their beds. She retrieved the gasoline, poured it over the bodies, and set them on fire with a lighter she’d brought for that purpose. As flames spread, she fled out the back door and jumped the fence – just as Amanda’s parents, Glen and Wanda Prewett, were pulling up.

The 911 Call That Came Too Late

Minutes earlier, Wanda Prewett had answered a call from her granddaughter Guinevere. In the background she heard noises and shouts of “Mommy, mommy,” before the line went dead.

The Prewetts arrived before 5 a.m. to find the house engulfed. They tried to save their family, suffering severe burns. They managed to pull only Guinevere’s body from the flames. Amanda’s and Texas’s bodies were recovered the next day from the rubble.

Meanwhile, Pittman returned home, washed blood from her bathroom – later confirmed by forensic tests – and incinerated her clothing and shoes in a burn pile behind her mother’s house.

The next day, she broke the murder weapon’s blade into about 20 pieces and scattered them in the woods. She burned the wooden handle. The metal shank she buried near a log.

A week later, under cover of darkness, she returned to the crime scene with soap and water to clean the fence rail she’d jumped, fearing blood from a cut on her left forearm might identify her. Investigators later photographed that scar.

The Investigation: 100 Leads, One Tip

Bowie County Sheriff’s Office and Texas Rangers investigated for three months. They interviewed dozens of ex-boyfriends, family members, and friends. A reward grew to over $140,000.

On June 14, 2011 – a month after the murders – CrimeStoppers received a tip from a California phone number naming Rachel Pittman and giving details matching the crime. It wasn’t prioritized.

The break came August 12, 2011. Pittman’s mother, Renee Pettigrew, called Sheriff James Prince in hysterics. Prince met them in a bank parking lot. Pittman, holding her Bible, said “I killed Amanda.”

At the Bi-State Justice Building in Texarkana, she waived her right to have her father or his attorney present. “She wanted to tell the truth and everything that happened.” Her demeanor, investigators testified, was “calm and matter-of-fact.”

The Motive: A Delusion, Not Revenge

This is why the Rachel Pittman case dominates true crime searches. There was no abuse, no robbery, no love triangle.

Pittman told lead investigator Robby McCarver she killed because she believed it was what an adult female friend – a woman in her mid-thirties who had once lived near her – wanted her to do. The woman had moved away months earlier. Pittman considered her a big sister.

Pittman wanted to wait until the children weren’t home, but she felt the friend was impatient. So she killed all three.

District Attorney Jerry Rochelle and Pittman’s own attorneys do not believe the friend encouraged her. Instead, multiple mental health reports concluded Pittman was “descending into psychosis” with onset paranoid schizophrenia.

Experts described:

• Delusional religious beliefs and “delusions of reference”
• Belief in “confirmations” from benign events – TV shows, billboards, unrelated conversations
• Hearing snakes talking like demons and seeing ghosts
• After the murders, seeing a “pink cloud” she believed were the victims’ souls

“Although it is evident she was aware her conduct was wrong and took steps to avoid detection, her delusional religious beliefs… led her to believe not only that her conduct was not wrong, but that it was the right thing to do,” one report stated.

Pittman was motivated to confess, reports say, by a “deepening commitment to religion.”

The Legal Maze: Why She Didn’t Get Life Without Parole

Pittman was initially charged with capital murder of multiple persons. She was 16, so Texas law prohibited the death penalty. Under Texas law, juveniles are adults at 17, but she was certified to stand trial as an adult.

Her attorneys filed notice of insanity defense. “The verdict form says, ‘Not guilty by reason of insanity.’ It doesn’t say, ‘Guilty but mentally ill,'” attorney Tonda Curry explained, noting juror fear often blocks insanity acquittals.

If convicted of capital murder, she faced automatic life with parole after 40 years. Instead, on January 31, 2013, Pittman pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder (for Amanda and Guinevere; Texas’s death was included). The plea gave her parole eligibility after 30 years – in 2041.

Judge Leon F. Pesek Jr. sealed the state’s file after the plea, keeping graphic autopsy photos from the public.

Life Behind Bars: From Juvenile to Hobby Unit

Pittman’s prison behavior has been turbulent. While in juvenile detention before certification, reports said she had “a following” where she “walks around and talks about God’s forgiveness in a distorted manner.” Her attitude shifted “from fairly pleasant to stone cold” when confronted.

At Bi-State jail:

• Jan 8, 2013: Ran down hallway, attacked inmate in laundry, knocked out tooth – pepper spray used
• Sept 1, 2012: Fought another inmate
• Sept 8, 2012: Stuffed paper in cell lock to plan another attack
• Feb 20, 2012: Used pencil sharpener blade to cut her long hair (fearing it could be grabbed in fights)

Her attorneys said she needs anti-psychotic treatment in prison. Texas Department of Criminal Justice records list her as:

• TDCJ #01830034, SID 08932389
• DOB: July 14, 1994 (now 31 in 2026)
• Current Facility: Hobby Unit (Marlin, TX)
• Sentence: Life
• Parole Eligibility: August 12, 2041

The Victims: Remembering Amanda, Guinevere, and Texas

True crime SEO must center victims.

Amanda Doss, 34, was a Redwater mother known for opening her home to neighborhood teens. She trusted Pittman enough to let her babysit.

Guinevere “Guin” Doss, 11, made the final phone call to her grandmother. She died trying to save her mother.

Texas Johnson, 8, was Amanda’s son. His body was so badly burned it took a day to recover.

Their family – the Prewetts – suffered severe burns attempting rescue. Their pain was evident at every hearing, though the case never went to full trial due to the plea.

Final Word

Rachel Pittman planned a triple murder with a kitchen knife and a soda bottle of gas. She cleaned the crime scene twice – once with fire, once with soap. Then she confessed to her mother while holding a Bible.

Was it psychosis or evil? Texas law said both could be true: she was mentally ill enough to need treatment, but aware enough to hide evidence and deserve life in prison.

In 2041, when she is 47, the parole board will weigh the pink cloud she saw – the souls of three people she stabbed and burned – against the 30 years she will have spent at Hobby Unit.

Until then, the Doss family murders remain a chilling lesson in how delusion can look like premeditation, and how a trusted babysitter can become a teen killer in the quiet hours before dawn on FM 991.