The Murder of Michelle Young

In the fall of 2006, a young mother’s lifeless body was found inside her suburban home in Raleigh. But when the victim’s husband was told about her death, his response was not the one investigators expected. Even though his wife’s family begged and pleaded for him to talk with police, he refused, citing advice from his attorney. No arrest was made for six years, until a judge’s ruling on a civil lawsuit finally gave local law enforcement the opening they’d been waiting for. But even then, questions remained about who really murdered Michelle Young.

The Enchanted Oaks subdivision in Raleigh lived up to its name, with traditional-style homes, tree-lined streets with lampposts, and basketball hoops in driveways, like something you’d see out of a sit-com or family movie. But on November 3, 2006, that neighborhood’s quiet existence was shattered when residents noticed a police presence at 5108 Birchleaf Drive. They knew the two-story brick home was occupied by Michelle and Jason Young, two professionals with a two-year-old daughter. The couple had bought the 2,800-sqare-foot home in May of 2005. The neighborhood, in close proximity to Lake Wheeler, featured 201 homes ranging from 2,100 to 4,200 square feet.

Neighbors were shocked when they learned someone had been found deceased inside the home, and that person was 29-year-old Michelle Young, who was pregnant with the couple’s second child. Two-year-old daughter Cassidy was inside the home, shaken up, but apparently unharmed. Sheriff’s investigators told the media that Michelle’s cause of death was a homicide, but they wouldn’t know more details until the medical examiner’s office released their official report.

Unfortunately, it happened to be Michelle’s sister, Meredith Fisher, who stopped by the Young home that afternoon. She said her brother-in-law had called her, telling her he thought he’d left a print-out of a purse he wanted to buy Michelle as a gift in their home office. He wanted Meredith to get the piece of paper before her sister came across it. Meredith didn’t think anyone would be home at the time. Jason was traveling for business, and Michelle should have been at work.

But when she entered the house, she noticed her sister’s lifeless body from her vantage point of the staircase. Then she noticed her two-year-old niece was upstairs, covered in blood but unharmed physically, talking about needing to help Mommy “because she had a lot of boo boos.” Cassidy had walked through her mother’s blood for hours, leaving small, child-sized red footprints all throughout the house.

Jason and Michelle met when both were students at N.C. State University, when they both went dancing at a place called the Have a Nice Day Café with their respective friend groups. Michelle, a former competitive gymnast and cheerleader, was obviously talented in choreography, while Jason, chose to stay close to the bar. Michelle’s friends said she coerced him out onto the dance floor, and they became a couple soon after.

The two were married in October of 2003. A dog Jason had rescued carried the wedding bands down the aisle of the chapel they rented out in downtown Raleigh. By the following spring, they welcomed daughter Cassidy. Michelle used her accounting degree and accepted a position as a senior tax consultant with Progress Energy. At the time of Michelle’s death, 32-year-old Jason out of town, as he worked as a medical software salesman.

The Wake County Sheriff’s Office seemed to be covering all their bases when it came to their investigation. When Michelle’s body was discovered, Jason was staying with family in Brevard, a small mountain town in Western North Carolina. Prior to that he’d been on a business trip in Virginia. When he returned to Raleigh, the sheriff’s office took his car, a Ford Explorer, two cell phones, luggage, and belongings of family members who had traveled with him. Within five days after his wife’s death, a Wake County Superior Court Judge ordered Jason to cooperate with the sheriff’s office and provide fingerprints, blood samples, and other material evidence as part of the investigation.

Michelle’s mother Linda Fisher made a public statement on November 13, 2006, asking for anyone who thought they had information relating to her daughter’s murder to come forward. She said it didn’t matter how small the detail was, it could help the case.

She continued, “We are shaken and heartbroken by the loss of Michelle. I have great faith in the police, that they will help find the person who is responsible for taking Michelle away from us.”

The Wake County district attorney did say that whoever was charged with Michelle’s murder would only face one count, as the current case law blocked prosecutors from charging any suspect with two murders because Michelle was pregnant. While other states had laws on the books that counted killing a pregnant woman as two counts of homicide, North Carolina did not.

What the Autopsy Showed

In early January of 2007, the state medical examiner’s office shared the results of Michelle Young’s autopsy. She died of blunt force trauma to her head. There were so many blows they had to be grouped based on the area of the body injured. Her lower left jaw was hit, causing numerous fractures. She had 13 lacerations on the back of her head, with evidence of brain hemorrhaging. Several teeth had been knocked out, and her lips were swollen and bruised. She was 20 weeks pregnant. There were no signs of sexual assault. Jason Young’s attorney, Roger Smith, Jr., could not be reached for a comment once the autopsy report became publicly available.

In the year following the murder, Michelle’s family and friends grew frustrated that Jason wouldn’t agree to an interview with investigators. He had moved back to Brevard to stay with his parents, taking daughter Cassidy with him.

Michelle Young’s Mother Takes Action

In October of 2007, Michelle’s mother, Linda Fisher, took matters into her own hands. She filed a wrongful death lawsuit against her former son-in-law, accusing him of killing Michelle, even though he hadn’t been formally charged by the Wake County Sheriff’s Department at that point. In this lawsuit she asked that all of Michelle’s assets and life insurance payouts go into a trust for the couple’s daughter. Michelle had a $1 million life insurance policy at the time of her death, and her husband was the sole beneficiary. She asked for damages in excess of $10,000 as well. Jason Young had 30 days to respond to the lawsuit. This civil suit would compel Jason to answer questions about his wife’s death if attorneys chose to subpoena him, something he’d been able to avoid up until that point. A News and Observer article that ran about this lawsuit pointed out similarities between Michelle Young and Cary murder victim Nancy Cooper. In that case, investigators waited to charge Brad Cooper with the murder of his wife until after he was filmed for a civil deposition in that case.

On December 5, 2008, Wake County Superior Judge Donald Stephens ruled that Jason Young was responsible for Michelle’s death. While Jason hadn’t yet been charged criminally, search warrants indicated that detectives were focusing their investigating on him as the primary suspect. The judge’s ruling came after Jason failed to respond to the lawsuit. But that also meant he didn’t have to answer questions about the case in a deposition. He was barred from collecting from Michelle’s life insurance or benefitting from her estate. Eventually, Michelle’s family was awarded $15.5 million as part of the settlement. They told the press the civil suit wasn’t about money, but about holding Jason accountable for his actions.

Finally, 37 months after Michelle’s death, Wake County investigators charged Jason Young with her murder. While they had quietly been gathering evidence in the case all along, the decision from the civil lawsuit helped convince a grand jury to finally bring murder charges against the main suspect. As the county’s district attorney, Colon Willoughby pointed out, building a forensic case in domestic homicides could be difficult. Hairs and other DNA evidence aren’t as significant, because two people already shared a home. They had been unable to find a murder weapon.

As their investigation proceeded, investigators discovered he’d been carrying on an extramarital affair with a woman in Florida, a woman that had been a sorority sister of Michelle’s. Jason failed to show up for court proceedings in February of 2008, causing him to lose custody of his daughter Cassidy. Instead, she went to live with her maternal grandmother. It was clear that Jason felt by not speaking on the record, and by ignoring court proceedings, he could not be compelled to give evidence that might be used against him in Michelle’s murder. But as a result, he lost custody of his child and was ordered to pay out a massive lawsuit to his deceased wife’s family.

The 2011 Trial

Jason Young’s trial began on June 8, 2011. The same judge who ruled over the civil lawsuit was assigned to Jason’s criminal trial. Michelle’s sister Meredith walked the jury through the events of November 3, 2006, when she discovered Michelle’s body and tried to comfort her 2-year-old niece, who told her “Mommy has boo boo’s everywhere. She needs a washcloth.”

Prosecutors said that although Jason had been traveling for work when his wife was murdered, they believed he left his hotel room in Virginia, drove to Raleigh, killed his wife, and then drove back to the hotel early in the morning.

Meredith Fisher, Michelle’s sister, shed light on Michelle and Young’s relationship during her time on the stand. She had previously lived with the couple while helping them care for Cassidy while they worked. She described their marriage as troubled, with Jason wanting to spend more time hanging out with his friends and Michelle complaining that he was too immature. He wanted his wife to show more sexual interest in him. Meredith, who had considered getting a master’s degree in counseling, offered to sit with the couple and help them with their issues. Michelle and Jason had very different communication styles—she would raise her voice and slam doors, he would sulk and give his wife the silent treatment.

Meredith said, “It was like a high school relationship when it came to learning how to argue and resolve things. The fight would start about picking up the kitchen, and it would escalate into 10 other issues.” Meredith and Michelle had lived through their parents divorce though, and Michelle didn’t want to put Cassidy through that.

Michelle and Jason had been arguing about the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, because Michelle’s mother Linda had been planning to visit. The couple couldn’t agree with how long she would stay in their home.

On the day Meredith found her sister deceased, she said Jason had left her a voicemail asking her to pick up some papers from the house. He had only given Michelle a card for their third wedding anniversary and received criticism from her family about it. So, he told Meredith he planned to buy Michelle a leather purse as a belated anniversary gift and had left a printout about it in his home office. He asked Meredith to pick it up so he wouldn’t ruin the surprise.

When she arrived at the house, she was surprised to find the lights on and her sister’s car in the driveway. The back gate was open, and when she headed up the stairs, she saw blood through the railing, covering the hall floor. At first, she thought it was hair dye that had been spilled on the floor, but then she saw her sister and knew it was something far more serious. When she picked up the phone to call 911, she saw her niece climb out from under the covers of her parents’ bed, where she’d been hiding.

Meredith was immediately concerned when Jason refused to talk to investigators after Michelle’s death. She asked him why he was reluctant, and all he would tell her was that he was following the advice of his attorney.

A Pattern of Infidelity

Jason’s mistress, a woman also named Michelle, took the stand to testify about her relationship with Jason. She said the two had bonded over their rocky marriages and experiences raising their young children. She spoke to him on the night of November 2, 2006, and even the morning of November 3, and said nothing stood out as remarkable about those conversations. He mentioned being worried about a printout he’d left out at home that his wife might find.

They even met up at Myrtle Beach after Michelle’s murder for a lengthy conversation on the beach. But she testified she never asked him if he had murdered his wife. The two had known each other since their college days at N.C. State but had grown closer in the fall of 2006. He flew to Florida to visit her for a tryst. When Michelle found out about her sorority sister’s murder, she flew to Raleigh to be with the family. When detectives uncovered the relationship, she agreed to speak with them, saying she and Jason had never been intimate after Michelle’s death.

Prosecutors also presented evidence that the same month Jason went to Florida to visit his girlfriend, he’d had an affair with a woman he’d met years earlier when he was a camp counselor in Brevard. She testified she’d kept in touch with Jason over the years and reached out to him when she was in Raleigh visiting. Michelle Young happened to be traveling for work when this woman spent several nights at their home. She was married at the time. She said she saw Jason after Michelle’s murder and he said he didn’t want to talk about it—that he’d been advised by his attorney not to say anything to anyone.

A woman Jason was engaged to before Michelle, Genevieve testified she’d argued with Jason after he drank too much at a wedding in Texas in 1999. He physically assaulted her in their hotel room and tried to pull her engagement ring off her finger. They broke things off not long after that, but kept in touch over the years. She said in September 2006, Jason sent her an email professing his love for her and asking to see her again. But he sent the e-mail to her previous employer, and she never saw it. She had quit that job after having her first child.

On the night of November 2, Jason had traveled to Virginia for his business trip, checking into a Hampton Inn in Hillsville, Virginia around 11 p.m. The hotel was approximately 160 miles from Raleigh. Prosecutors told the jury they believed Jason had left the hotel right before midnight, driven back to his home, murdered Michelle, and then returned to Virginia after making a stop for gas around 5:30 a.m. in King, North Carolina, about 40 miles from that Virginia Hampton Inn. He was seen on video surveillance leaving the hotel, and a convenience clerk in King testified selling gas to him in the early morning hours of November 3.

Michelle’s mother testified she knew her daughter was unhappy in the marriage but didn’t realize how toxic it had become. She the two didn’t even seem to love one another anymore, but she encouraged Michelle to try and work things out. A few different times she directed statements directly at Jason and raised her voice, leaving the judge to warn her about her behavior more than once.

Linda Fisher said after Michelle’s death, she and her other daughter Meredith sought out court-ordered visitation with Cassidy. After debating different schedules, Linda said her attorney told her Jason had agreed to give Meredith primary custody of Cassidy. He wouldn’t sit for a deposition in the custody case or agree to a forensic psychological evaluation.

On the eleventh day of the trial, Jason Young took the stand to testify on his own behalf. He shared the story of putting a love note his wife had given him early in their relationship into the coffin with her body at the funeral. He denied murdering Michelle. He admitted he had not been a good husband, and had not been faithful. When asked if he had married Michelle because she’d gotten pregnant with their daughter, he said the pregnancy had “only expedited the inevitable.” He tried to explain away a size 12 shoe print found on a pillow near his wife’s body. He said he had once owned a pair of black shoes in that size, but thought Michelle had donated them to Goodwill.

He testified when he got to his hotel room at the Hampton Inn on the night of November 2, he’d left the room door ajar so he could go downstairs and get a charger out of his vehicle. He realized an outside door to the hotel would lock, so he put twigs from bush in it to keep it open, then returned to his hotel room to do more work. Before midnight, he walked through the lobby to get a paper so he could check the sports schedules while smoking a cigar outside. When he returned to his room, he did so by going through that side door he’d propped open earlier. He said he’d hired a lawyer before talking to police because his friends advised him to do that when they found out Michelle had been murdered. Then he kept silent because that was what his attorney told him to do.

When it came to physical evidence tying Jason to the crime, it appeared to be lacking. Investigators didn’t find any evidence of his blood or Michelle’s in his Explorer, nor on the clothes they took from the SUV after the murder.

In late June of 2011, the jurors in the trial, which consisted of five men and seven women, deliberated for four days. Out of the twelve, initially eight wanted an acquittal, and four wanted a conviction. After a lunch break and more discussions, two jurors changed their views. But it wasn’t enough for a conviction. Judge Donald Stephens had no choice but to declare a mistrial.

Jason was released from the Wake County jail after the mistrial on a $900,000 bond.

The 2012 Trial

Jason’s second trial began on February 6, 2012, with eight women and two men. In her opening arguments, Assistant District Attorney Becky Holt told the jury that Jason Young waited 1,693 days to finally give his account of where he was while his wife was being beaten to death. That was during his testimony at his first trial. He never asked the police about how their investigation was proceeding. He never acted like he cared who murdered his wife. He didn’t sit for a deposition in the custody hearings regarding his and Michelle’s daughter. He gave up parenting to his in-laws without a fight. He simply clammed up. She asked if he was innocent, why would he wait so long to tell his side of the story? To provide his alibi? In response, Jason’s defense attorney Mike Klinkosum, said police immediately focused on Jason as the prime suspect, and didn’t focus on any other leads that may have existed.

He told the jury, “You’re going to hear he acted like an obnoxious jerk. It was not a good marriage. He acted like a jerk. But what you’ve got to remember ladies and gentlemen is that we don’t convict people of murder when they’ve acted like jerks. He said his client would not have had time to do what the prosecutors said he did, traveling from Virginia to Raleigh in the middle of the night to murder Michelle.

During the second trial, a therapist Michelle had seen about a week before her death testified. Michelle discussed feeling isolated and alone during her second pregnancy. She mentioned her husband having anger issues. A high school friend of Michelle’s testified that Michelle said Jason did not want her to continue her pregnancy with her first child and mentioned he would resent her and the baby for the rest of their lives. They married anyway and became parents. They argued about their finances. They kept one bank account for family finances and a separate one for each of them because they couldn’t agree on personal spending. Michelle wasn’t happy about Jason having an online gambling account, but felt like she couldn’t pester him about it because he was successful in his career.

Jason’s defense attorneys pointed out their client had no wounds when the police looked him over after the murder. No cuts, scrapes, bruises, anything that a person who beat their spouse more than 30 times would surely have had. However, one thing they never presented was a theory on who might have murdered Michelle. They vaguely pointed out a couple of drawers in their bedroom were open when her body was discovered, but I never read any information about jewelry or other value items that had been stolen. Who else would have wanted to enter the home in the middle of the night and commit murder, leaving a small child inside the home completely unharmed?

The three women who had testified in Jason’s first trial returned for the second—the ex-fiancee from N.C. State, the former camper who’d been with Jason while Michelle was out of town, and Michelle’s sorority sister from college.

A state trooper testified about a wreck Michelle and Jason were in during May 2006. It was a single-car wreck that took place outside Brevard. Allegedly, Michelle was pregnant at the time and had a miscarriage after the accident, which resulted after their Mitsubishi careened down an embankment and partially submerged into a river. After that accident, the two increased their life insurance. The state trooper who investigated the wreck said he didn’t think it was suspicious at first, but prosecutors felt it was important to share with the jury.

In early March of 2012, the jury began their deliberations. On March 6, they returned a guilty verdict. Thirty-seven-year-old Jason Young showed no emotion as the verdict was read. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

In 2014, the North Carolina Court of Appeals awarded Jason a new trial, according to news station WRAL.

Jason’s attorneys had argued that having Superior Court Judge Donald Stephens preside over the civil suit against Jason and his criminal trial poisoned the jury against him. Prosecutors appealed that ruling to the state Supreme Court, which said the Court of Appeals erred in ordering a new trial but said other issues from the trial needed further review.

A State Court of Appeals declined to overturn the results of the second trial.

As of April 2025, the News and Observer reported Jason Young, now age 50 remains incarcerated at a medium-security Piedmont Correctional Institution in Salisbury.

To hear the full version of this case, check out Ep. 159 of the Missing in the Carolinas podcast.