Overview

• Austin police named Robert Eugene Brashers after a Y-STR profile and DNA from under Amy Ayers’ fingernails matched his known genetic profile.
• A .380 shell casing from the scene generated a NIBIN match to an unsolved Kentucky homicide, providing a cross-jurisdictional ballistics link.
• Investigators noted Brashers was stopped near El Paso less than 48 hours after the killings in a stolen car while carrying a .380 pistol of the same make and model used.
• Brashers died by suicide in 1999 and has been linked by DNA to other murders and sexual assaults in South Carolina, Missouri and Tennessee, with no evidence of an accomplice in Austin.
• Travis County District Attorney José Garza said the inquiry remains open, stated the evidence indicates the innocence of the four previously prosecuted men, and pledged accountability for past errors.