Overview
- Austin police said Tuesday that Luis Fernando Benitez-Gonzalez, 26, is charged with murder in Alyssa Rivera’s June 2024 death and two late-2025 aggravated assaults after an April 27 arrest in Dallas.
- Investigators said DNA links the 2024 and 2018 homicides, and ballistics connect the two 2025 shootings to the same gun.
- A surviving victim seized the attacker’s phone, and a warrant search found selfies and location data that placed Benitez-Gonzalez near the 2018 dump site and tied him to video with Rivera.
- Police said he admitted being with both women and described strangling them, while detectives say the evidence does not support his self-defense claim.
- Authorities described him as a transient with ties across Austin, Dallas–Fort Worth, Houston, Lockhart and Hidalgo County, and they urged other possible victims to contact police as they review the 2018 case for charges.